# The adviser regime (2025 GwG revision) **In force 1 October 2026.** Enacted 26 September 2025, BBl 2025 2899. Until that date these articles exist only in the Federal Gazette text, not in the consolidated GwG. **Why this matters:** the 2025 revision extends Swiss anti-money-laundering duties beyond financial intermediaries to **advisers** (*Beraterinnen und Berater*) — the gatekeeper professions the AMLR captures as non-financial obliged entities. It is the single largest scope change in Swiss AML law in the concordance period, and it is what several AMLR articles map onto for the first time. ## A deliberately narrower duty set Advisers do **not** get the full financial-intermediary due-diligence package. GwG Art. 8b Abs. 1 lists exactly three carried-over duties: | Adviser duty | Cross-reference | |---|---| | identify the client | Art. 3 Abs. 1 | | establish the beneficial owner | Art. 4 Abs. 1 and Abs. 2 Bst. a and b | | documentation | Art. 7 | Plus, from Art. 8b Abs. 2–3: identify the **object and purpose** of the business or service the client wants, and **clarify the background and purpose** where the high risks of the business, service or client justify it. **What is absent is as important as what is present:** there is no ongoing-monitoring duty and no re-identification duty for advisers. A one-to-one pin from an AMLR customer-due- diligence article to Art. 8b therefore maps a *narrower* obligation than the AMLR imposes. ## Risk-based calibration is delegated to self-regulation Art. 8c makes the extent of the duties depend on risk, and hands the calibration to the **self-regulatory organisation**: the SRO sets the scope for its affiliated advisers, provides for simplified or enhanced duties, and in particular fixes the circumstances in which an adviser must clarify background and purpose under Art. 8b Abs. 3. Art. 8d requires organisational measures — adequate staff training and controls — to prevent money laundering, terrorist financing and breaches of coercive measures under the Embargo Act (EmbG, SR 946.231). ## Reporting and the right to terminate Art. 9b Abs. 2^bis: an adviser who files a report **may terminate the business relationship at any time**. ## Which supervisor applies (Art. 12a) Where someone is both a financial intermediary and an adviser, supervision is consolidated rather than split: - a financial intermediary under Art. 2 Abs. 2 subject to a special-statute supervisory authority → **that authority supervises all** their activities (Abs. 1); - a financial intermediary under Art. 2 Abs. 3 affiliated to a recognised SRO → **that SRO supervises all** their activities (Abs. 2); - intermediaries under Art. 2 Abs. 2 Bst. a^bis under a supervisory organisation per FINMAG Art. 43a → that supervisory organisation, for all activities (Abs. 3). Art. 2b handles the substantive overlap: where the same activity counts as both financial intermediation and advice, **the financial-intermediary rules govern** (Abs. 1); a person acting in both capacities is subject to the rules relevant to each, but may elect to submit all their activities to the financial-intermediary rules (Abs. 2). ## Sources - GwG (as amended 26.09.2025, BBl 2025 2899, in force 1.10.2026), Art. 2b, 8b, 8c, 8d, 9b Abs. 2^bis, 12a - EmbG SR 946.231 · FINMAG SR 956.1, Art. 43a