FINMA, FinTech Licences and P2P Lending: What Investors Should Check

Many Swiss P2P lending platforms mention FINMA somewhere on their website. Some display a licence number. Some link to a register entry. None of this means FINMA has approved the platform, endorsed its business model, or checked whether your money is safe. Understanding what FINMA actually does, and does not do, is the single most useful piece of due diligence you can perform before sending money to any lending platform.

This article explains, in plain and generic terms, how Swiss financial supervision touches P2P and crowdlending platforms, what a FinTech licence covers, why custody structure matters more than any regulatory label, and how to verify a platform’s claims yourself using FINMA’s public resources. It ends with a step-by-step verification checklist you can run before investing.

What FINMA does and does not do for lending platforms

FINMA (the Swiss Financial Market Supervisory Authority) supervises banks, insurers, and certain other financial intermediaries. Its job is to authorise entities that fall under specific regulatory categories, to check those entities meet ongoing requirements, and to intervene when they do not. FINMA does not rate products, does not vouch for business models, and does not “approve” a platform in the sense of certifying that it is a good or safe place to invest.

Swiss financial supervision works through categories of authorisation. Different activities trigger different obligations. Taking deposits from the public, for example, is a highly regulated activity generally reserved for licensed banks. Facilitating loans between private investors and borrowers without ever holding client money as a deposit is a different activity, and may fall under a lighter-touch regime, or under no direct FINMA licensing requirement at all, depending on exactly how the platform is structured.

This is why two platforms can both mention “FINMA” and mean completely different things. One might hold a genuine authorisation for a specific regulated activity. Another might simply state that its activity does not require a licence under current rules, which may be entirely true and entirely unremarkable. A platform can be fully law-abiding and still hold no FINMA licence, because its structure never triggers a licensing requirement in the first place. Read our regulation overview for how these categories relate to lending specifically.

The practical takeaway: never treat a mention of FINMA, a licence number, or a register entry as a safety signal on its own. Treat it as a starting point for verification, covered in the checklist further down.

The FinTech licence and public-deposit rules in plain English

Switzerland created a lighter authorisation category, often referred to as the FinTech licence, aimed at firms that take public deposits or comparable funds but do not want to run a full banking operation. Firms holding this type of authorisation face lower capital and organisational requirements than a bank, but also face limits, such as a cap on the total amount of public funds they may hold, and restrictions on what they may do with those funds, for example a prohibition on investing them at interest on the firm’s own account.

The core concept underneath all of this is the “public deposit.” Swiss law treats accepting repayable funds from the public as a sensitive activity, because depositors are relying on the institution to safeguard and return their money. Many P2P lending platforms are structured deliberately to avoid ever holding a public deposit: investor funds might sit briefly in a segregated account before being matched to a specific loan, or move through a partner bank, or never be held by the platform itself at all. The legal and practical difference between “the platform holds your money” and “the platform merely arranges a transfer between you and a borrower” is exactly the kind of detail that determines which rules apply.

Because these structures vary and because the rules themselves are technical, this article deliberately avoids citing specific thresholds, article numbers, or franc amounts. Treat any number you see quoted elsewhere as something to verify against FINMA’s own current guidance, not as a fixed fact to memorise. Our methodology page explains how we approach claims like these when reviewing a platform.

AML/KYC obligations

Separately from deposit-taking rules, Swiss anti-money-laundering law (AMLA/GwG) imposes know-your-customer and ongoing monitoring duties on financial intermediaries, including many platforms that arrange loans or payments. In practice this means a legitimate platform will ask you to verify your identity, will ask about the source of the funds you invest, and may ask follow-up questions if your activity looks unusual for your profile.

Entities subject to these duties typically affiliate with a recognised self-regulatory organisation (SRO) or are supervised directly, depending on their activity and structure. A platform that never asks for identity verification before you can invest meaningful sums, or that seems indifferent to where money comes from, is showing a gap worth investigating rather than a shortcut worth appreciating.

AML/KYC compliance is a process obligation, not a guarantee of platform solvency or of loan quality. A platform can run a rigorous KYC process and still have a fragile business model, weak underwriting, or poor loan-book performance. Treat KYC diligence as one item among several on your platform checklist, not as the whole picture.

Custody and what happens to deposits if a platform fails

This is arguably the most important practical question, and it is a question about contract and account structure, not about regulatory labels. Ask: where does my money sit while it is not yet lent out, and where does it sit while a loan is outstanding? Is it in an account in my own name, in a segregated client account held by the platform on my behalf, or commingled with the platform’s own operating funds?

If the platform fails, becomes insolvent, or simply stops operating, the answer to that question determines what happens next. Funds held in a properly segregated client account are generally easier to trace and return to investors than funds mixed into the platform’s general assets, which may become part of a bankruptcy estate and subject to a claims process alongside other creditors. Outstanding loans themselves also need a continuity plan: if the platform that services the loan disappears, does someone else step in to collect repayments and pass them to investors, or does the loan simply stop being serviced?

Lending investments are not bank deposits and are not covered by deposit protection schemes, regardless of what licence, if any, the platform holds. A FinTech licence, where one applies, addresses how deposits may be handled while a firm is a going concern; it does not create a deposit-guarantee outcome equivalent to a bank account. This distinction should be checked directly in the platform’s own terms and conditions, not assumed from marketing language.

Using FINMA’s public resources

FINMA maintains public information that lets you check claims yourself rather than relying on a platform’s own description of its status. In general terms, this includes registers of entities holding specific authorisations or affiliations, and a public warning list of entities FINMA has flagged for operating without required authorisation or for other concerns. These resources are generic tools: they tell you whether an entity appears in a given category, not whether an investment is a good idea.

A sensible habit is to check any platform you are considering against both the relevant register and the warning list, using the exact legal entity name printed in the platform’s own terms and conditions rather than its marketing brand name, since these can differ. Absence from the warning list is not the same as a positive endorsement; it simply means FINMA has not (yet) flagged that entity publicly. Start from https://www.finma.ch/ and navigate to the relevant register or warning list section for the entity type in question.

A licence and custody verification flow

Use this sequence before investing meaningful sums in any platform. It is designed to move from the easiest checks to the more time-consuming ones, so you can stop early if something already looks wrong.

• Find the platform’s exact legal entity name and registered address in its terms and conditions, imprint, or contract documents, not just its marketing brand name.
• Note any specific regulatory claim the platform makes about itself, such as a licence type, register entry, or SRO affiliation, and note it word for word.
• Check the entity name against the relevant FINMA register for the authorisation category claimed, and separately against FINMA’s public warning list.
• If the platform claims it does not need a licence, look for a clear, specific explanation of why, based on how client funds and loan structures actually flow, not a vague reassurance.
• Read the terms and conditions section on custody of investor funds: is money held in your name, in a segregated client account, or commingled with the platform’s own assets?
• Read the terms and conditions section on loan servicing continuity: what happens to outstanding loans and repayments if the platform stops operating?
• Confirm whether the platform states, anywhere, that investments are not bank deposits and are not covered by deposit protection.
• Check whether AML/KYC verification is required before you can invest a meaningful amount; treat an absence of this step as a warning sign.
• Cross-check any regulatory claim against our regulation overview and run the platform through our broader risk screener before committing funds.

None of these steps require legal training. They require reading the platform’s own documents carefully and cross-checking specific, factual claims against a public source. If a platform cannot or will not answer these questions clearly, that itself is useful information. For a broader walkthrough of comparing platforms side by side, see our guide to Swiss P2P lending platforms.

Frequently asked questions