Finance careers in Switzerland: how Zürich and Geneva actually hire

Not a smaller London

People who know New York or London and arrive in Zürich expecting the same market at a smaller scale misread it in three ways. They look for the investment banking division and find it is not the centre of gravity. They apply for a ten-week summer internship and find that the standard first contract is six or twelve months. And they assume English will carry them through, which it does on a trading floor and often does not in a meeting with a Swiss family that has banked with the same house for three generations.

Switzerland manages a very large share of the world's cross-border private wealth, and the financial centre is built around that fact. The largest employers of junior finance talent in Zürich and Geneva are wealth managers, asset managers, insurers and the cantonal banks, with investment banking, trading, commodity trade finance, fintech and the regulators and exchange around them. For someone deciding on a career, this is good news: there are more kinds of entry role than in a market organised around advisory, and the skills (valuation, portfolio construction, risk, client judgement) overlap heavily with what the Academy teaches. It also means the question "how do I get into investment banking in Switzerland?" is narrower than the useful one, which is "where in Swiss finance should I be aiming?"

Not only does the Swiss Finance offer a valuable source of instruction, its location in Switzerland allows for an invaluable opportunity to learn international finance.

Because the program is located in Europe, and especially with the heritage of the unique Swiss banking system, it was an ideal location.

The shape of the market

Wealth management and private banking

The core of Swiss finance and the largest hirer. The large universal banks, the Geneva and Zürich private banks, and a long tail of smaller houses and independent asset managers employ relationship managers, investment advisers, product specialists, and the compliance, operations and reporting staff behind them. The entry roles are assistant relationship manager, investment advisory analyst, product analyst and the graduate rotations that pass through all of them. Client contact starts early, which is why the language expectation is strictest here.

Asset management

Institutional asset managers, the asset-management arms of the banks and insurers, pension-fund managers and a growing number of alternatives firms. Entry roles are research and portfolio analyst positions, risk, performance and quantitative work. This is the part of the market most open to English-only candidates with strong technical skills, and the part that corresponds most closely to the allocator thinking the Academy's Institutional Investors Course teaches.

Investment banking and advisory

Smaller than in London or Frankfurt but real: the investment bank of the largest Swiss bank, the Swiss offices of the international banks, and a set of independent advisory firms that work on Swiss mid-market transactions, succession sales of family companies and cross-border deals. Analyst classes are small, which means fewer seats and more weight on each internship. Zürich holds most of it; Geneva has a smaller advisory community alongside its wealth and commodity businesses.

Trading and markets, insurance, the cantonal banks

Zürich has trading floors at the large banks and a cluster of proprietary and asset-management trading; Geneva is one of the world's centres of commodity trading and the trade finance that supports it, a career most foreign candidates have never considered. The two large Swiss insurers and the reinsurers run investment, actuarial and finance functions that hire quantitatively minded graduates. The cantonal banks (one for most cantons, state-backed) are large, stable employers of corporate bankers, credit analysts and treasury staff, and they hire mostly locally and in the local language.

The regulator, the exchange and fintech

The financial-market supervisor, the national bank, the stock exchange and the market-infrastructure firms hire economists, analysts and technologists, mostly through graduate schemes. Zug and Zürich have a dense cluster of crypto, payments and data firms whose finance and business roles draw from the same pool.

The routes in

The long internship

The Swiss first contract is an internship ("Praktikum" in German-speaking Switzerland, "stage" in French-speaking) of six months to a year, full time, paid, and advertised throughout the year rather than in a single autumn round. For the employer it is an extended assessment; for the candidate it is where the real selection happens. It is normal to complete one or two before a permanent offer, sometimes at different firms, and the second is often arranged through the first. Summer internships of ten to twelve weeks exist, mainly at the international banks and the largest Swiss bank, and are recruited on the London-style calendar, but they are a minority of the placements. A candidate who can only offer eight weeks in July is competing for a small pool; one who can offer six months from January is competing for a much larger one. The off-cycle internships guide covers the mechanics.

Graduate programmes

The large banks, insurers and asset managers run rotational graduate programmes of twelve to twenty-four months, with an autumn intake, applications the previous autumn and winter, and a selection process of tests, interviews and an assessment day. They are the structured route for graduates of Swiss and foreign universities and they draw on the internship pool heavily: a strong intern is often offered a graduate place without re-applying.

The apprenticeship

Switzerland has a route that exists in no other major financial centre. The commercial banking apprenticeship ("kaufmännische Lehre" with a banking specialisation) takes school-leavers at fifteen or sixteen for three years of paid, rotational work combined with vocational school, and the banks treat it as a serious pipeline: a large share of Swiss relationship managers, operations managers and some senior executives began that way, and the apprentices who go on to a university of applied sciences or a federal diploma in the evenings are among the best-prepared junior staff in the market. It is open only to those in the Swiss school system, so it is not a route for international candidates, but it explains something foreign applicants find puzzling: the colleague who is twenty-four, has no bachelor's degree and knows the bank far better than they do.

Lateral moves

Zürich and Geneva recruit a steady flow of people with two to five years' experience from London and Frankfurt, from the large accounting firms, from consulting and from the finance functions of Swiss corporates. For international candidates who cannot get a first job in Switzerland, this is often the realistic path: a first role elsewhere, a Swiss employer later, when the permit arithmetic is easier.

In order to fully understand Wall Street, the financial City of London and the Swiss Banking industry and to reach my long-term goal in succeeding in the rough and competitive world of investment banking, I believed that I need to attend a program such as the one offered by Swiss Finance.

Language: what is expected, and where

Switzerland has four national languages and the financial centre works in two of them plus English. Zürich, Basel, Zug and the German-speaking cantons use Swiss German in speech and standard German in writing; Geneva, Lausanne and the French-speaking cantons use French; Lugano uses Italian. English is the working language of the trading floors, of most asset-management and quantitative teams, of the international banks' Swiss offices and of the fintech cluster, and a candidate with none of the national languages can build a career in those parts of the market.

Client-facing work is different. A relationship manager in Zürich needs German; one in Geneva needs French; a corporate banker at a cantonal bank needs the local language without exception; an advisory analyst working on the sale of a family company in Lucerne will sit in meetings conducted in Swiss German. Employers also read the language as a signal. A foreign candidate who has reached a working level of German or French is telling the employer they intend to stay, which matters to a firm that expects to train an intern for six months.

Work permits: the rule that shapes the list

Switzerland is not in the European Union but has a free-movement agreement with it, so citizens of EU and EFTA countries can take up employment with relatively little friction: the employer registers the position and a permit follows. Citizens of other countries, including the United Kingdom since its departure from the EU, the United States, India, China and most of the world, are "third-country nationals". For them, work permits are subject to annual quotas set by the federal government, and an employer has to show that the role could not be filled by a Swiss or EU candidate and that the applicant is a qualified specialist. Large firms do this for people they want; they rarely do it for interns.

Two provisions soften this for students. Graduates of Swiss universities from third countries may stay for a limited period after graduating to look for work in their field, and a job found in that window is treated more favourably than one applied for from abroad. And internships that are a required part of a degree course can often be permitted for foreign students enrolled at a Swiss institution. The details change and the cantons apply them differently, so the right sources are the federal migration authority and the international office of the university concerned. The planning consequence is the same as everywhere: decide which markets you can actually work in before you build an application list around them. For a third-country candidate, the realistic Swiss routes are usually a Swiss degree, or a lateral move after a first job in a market where they have the right to work.

Universities and the networks that feed the market

Swiss employers recruit from the whole Swiss university system and from abroad, but a few institutions have especially dense pipelines into finance: the University of St. Gallen for banking, wealth management and consulting; ETH Zürich and EPFL for quantitative, trading and risk roles; the University of Zürich and the University of Basel for banking and asset management; HEC Lausanne and the University of Geneva for the French-speaking market and for wealth management. The universities of applied sciences supply a large share of the cantonal banks' and insurers' intake, often from the apprenticeship route. For a foreign student, a master's degree at one of these is the most direct way into the Swiss market, because of the permit provisions above and because the career services and alumni networks are built around Swiss employers.

None of this makes a Swiss degree a requirement. International banks' Swiss offices hire from London and continental universities, asset managers hire quantitative graduates from everywhere, and the internship-first structure means a candidate from any university who can commit six months and has the right to work can enter through a placement.

What is different about a Swiss application

• The CV is complete and chronological. A Swiss CV is expected to account for every period since school, with months and years, and gaps are asked about. It commonly runs to two pages and, by tradition, carries a photograph and date of birth; some employers now ask candidates not to include them, so follow the employer's instruction and the default of the market.
• Reference letters are read. Swiss employment law entitles every employee and intern to a written reference ("Arbeitszeugnis", "certificat de travail") on leaving, and employers read them closely, including for the coded phrasing that signals a lukewarm view. Ask for yours at the end of every internship and check it.
• Precision is a competency. A cover letter with a wrong date, a misspelt name or an inconsistent figure is read as evidence about how you will handle a client's affairs. Reliability, punctuality and thoroughness are scored, in interviews and in internship reviews, with a weight that American and British candidates sometimes underestimate.
• Military service. Swiss men complete compulsory service in blocks over several years; employers are used to it and it is accounted for in contracts. Foreign candidates do not have it and should not worry about it, but should understand why a Swiss colleague disappears for three weeks.
• Salaries are discussed openly and precisely. Swiss employers usually ask for a salary expectation in the application and state the internship or starting salary in the offer. Figures are high by European standards and so is the cost of living; compare both, in Swiss francs, before deciding whether an offer is good.
• The process is slower and more thorough. Multiple interviews, a case or presentation, reference checks, and a decision that may take weeks. Chasing is acceptable once and politely.

Swiss Finance instructors quickly pushed us to take the leap from theory to application.

Our location in Switzerland also contributed to this.

A year's plan for a candidate aiming at Switzerland

The Academy teaches from Zürich and has done so for people who went on to Swiss and international employers, and the honest summary of the market is this: it rewards preparation, patience and language more than any other financial centre, and it offers more kinds of entry role than candidates from London or New York expect. Aim at the sector, not the label.

Questions people ask

Can I work in Swiss finance without German or French?

In some teams, yes: trading, parts of asset management, quantitative roles and the international teams of the large banks often work in English. Client-facing roles in wealth management and domestic advisory expect the local language, and most Swiss employers see the language as a sign of commitment to the market.

Are Swiss internships paid?

Yes, as a rule. Internships at banks, asset managers and insurers are paid positions of several months, usually full time, and they are treated as the first stage of hiring rather than as work experience.

Do I need a Swiss university degree?

No, but it helps with the job-search permit for non-EU graduates and with the networks that feed Swiss employers. Graduates of universities abroad enter mostly through internships and graduate programmes, and from London or Frankfurt through lateral moves.

Is Zürich or Geneva better for investment banking?

Zürich has the larger investment banking and trading presence and the headquarters of the largest Swiss bank; Geneva's strength is private banking, wealth management and commodity trade finance. For advisory, Zürich; for wealth and trade finance, Geneva; for asset management, both.