Pourquoi Genève ?

Why Geneva?

Located at the heart of Europe, the Geneva financial center is in constant communication with the old Continent as well as with the Asian and American financial centers, making it a leading-edge hub for wealth management.

Pourquoi Genève ?

As an international city, Geneva offers a favourable environment for business and finance, in large part due to its excellent infrastructure and highly skilled workforce. These advantages give Geneva a competitive edge, allowing it to offer an exceptionally diverse pool of skills and position itself as a key player in innovation and technology.

Geneva also boasts a long multicultural tradition. One hundred and forty multinational companies, 36 international organizations and over 300 non-governmental organisations currently call the city home. International rankings consistently place Geneva in the top tier of business centers.

Geneva Financial Center

Competition

Talents

Innovation

Sustainable

The World Economic Forum (WEF) and IMD Business School rank Switzerland among the world’s most competitive nations. The results suggest that Switzerland is by far the most advanced in the world in vocational training. Switzerland is also the most effective with active labour market policies encouraging reskilling and retraining. Furthermore, it is part of the few innovation powerhouses in the world. Switzerland has one of the most stable financial markets.

A stable financial system is an essential prerequisite for an open, export-oriented economy. Switzerland has long been recognized as one of the most stable nations in the world, due to the stability of its legal and political system and the health of its economy and public finances.

The financial center benefits from Switzerland’s extensive network of free trade agreements. In addition to the EFTA Convention and the free trade agreement with the European Union (EU), Switzerland has signed 28 free trade agreements with 38 partners outside the EU, including many key economies. It was for instance the first European nation to sign an agreement with Japan. Moreover, In May 2014 the Swiss Federal Council adopted the OECD standard for automatic exchange of tax information. In October of the same year, the Swiss government signed the Multilateral Competent Authority Agreement to Automatically Exchange Financial Account Information.

Investors from all over the world value the transparency and reliability of Geneva's economy and regulatory framework. Its stable political structure, robust parliamentary democracy, reliable legal system and well-governed domestic institutions boost the attractiveness of its economic environment. This is the reason why so many multinationals have decided to move their European headquarters to Geneva.

Geneva hosts 87 banking institutions and is universally recognized as a global financial center with a long tradition of wealth management and commodity trading. Few financial centers offer such a diverse pool of skills and dense network of finance-related activities, including international law firms, insurance and inspection companies, auditors, and shipping companies. This unique chain of expertise acts as a magnet for multinationals and enhances Geneva's reputation as a city of superlatives.

Geneva's traditional know-how and highly skilled workforce have helped build its global reputation as a center of expertise in wealth management and commodity trading. Few financial centers offer such a diverse pool of skills and dense network of finance-related activities, including international law firms, insurance and inspection companies, auditors, and shipping companies. This unique chain of expertise acts as a magnet for multinationals. According to the IMD World Talent Ranking 2023, Switzerland leads the top 10 economies in developing, attracting and retaining talent, for the 10th year running.

According to the World Economic Forum's Global Competitiveness Report, Switzerland's productivity can be explained in part by the excellence of its educational system, as well as a financial sector that offers professionals ample opportunities to pursue further education in order to meet the requirements of a constantly changing world.

Maintaining Geneva’s position as a leading financial center is a key priority for the city. One of the missions of the Geneva Financial Center (GFC) is therefore to deliver high-quality training in banking and finance.  The Foundation also organises events to support knowledge sharing. Investment in training is essential for the financial sector; banking professionals need to hone their skills and knowledge throughout their careers in order to successfully face the challenges of evolving regulations and new technologies.  

The GFC has identified four priority objectives to raise the level of continuing professional development:

  • provide a clear picture of the training that is available;
  • ensure that supply matches demand;
  • promote research and events relating to continuing professional development in the banking sector;
  • support talented young professionals.

The Geneva Financial Center strongly encourages public-private partnerships in the academic field. For instance, it has provided support to the Geneva Financial Research Institute (GFRI) at the University of Geneva since its creation in 2009.

The World Economic Forum’s Global Information Technology Report 2016 already placed Switzerland among the 10 nations that are best equipped to face technological changes, due amongst other factors to substantial investments in digital technology. Switzerland is also the industrialized nation with the highest percentage of people working in research and development.

Today, Switzerland is still in the top ten according to IMD.

Technology plays an increasingly important role in future relationships between banks and their customers. Customers are becoming increasingly demanding, particularly in retail banking, leaving banks no option but to embrace innovation.

Wealth management is no exception to this rule, as clients become increasingly connected to the online world. Some observers have even surmised that wealth management might one day be wholly automated!

Geneva is known as a global center for commodity trading and trade finance. Around 400 companies in the greater Geneva area handle a large proportion of the global trade in oil, sugar, coffee, cereals, rice and oilseeds. Rigorous risk management and outstanding customer service are essential to this industry. The recent wave of regulation has added an extra layer of requirements. Technology has thus become indispensable in commodity trading as well.

These new requirements and new services have led to the convergence of finance and technology, referred to as FinTech.

The Geneva financial center stands out from the competition due to the quality of service and security it offers, both in terms of stability and data protection. With its emphasis on transparency as well as privacy, the financial center benefits from a know-how that is firmly rooted in tradition, but is nevertheless innovative and technologically advanced. Geneva's economic "cluster" is not confined to banks: it also includes financial market infrastructure providers, software developers and other suppliers of products and services.

The Geneva Financial Center aims to help Geneva become a center of excellence in financial technology and is working in particular to create an appropriate legal framework.

Geneva occupies a unique position in the sustainable finance world, thanks to its dynamic ecosystem comprised of financial institutions, asset managers, international organisations, NGOs, private foundations, and world-class universities. With strong support from the city, the canton and the federal government, this diverse community is working together to create a virtuous cycle and accelerate the transition to a sustainable economy.

Geneva is home to the Sustainable Development Goals, the UN’s ambitious agenda to address the 17 major challenges facing our world. Changing the way financial flows are allocated can help speed up progress towards these goals. Over the past 20 years, a growing number of banks and asset managers have adopted sustainable investment strategies. They believe that the key to Geneva's future competitiveness lies in constant innovation and in developing new business activities, such as sustainable finance.

Their commitment and expertise is now globally recognised. The Geneva Financial Center Foundation has been working closely with national industry associations to capitalise on our synergies. The Swiss Bankers Association (SBA) and the Asset Management Association Switzerland (AMAS) have set up branch offices at the GFCF's headquarters in Geneva to focus mainly on sustainable finance, reinforcing the city’s position as a centre of excellence. Unsurprisingly, Geneva is a member, alongside Zurich, of Financial Centers for Sustainability (FC4S), a worldwide network of 25 member cities, which has its headquarters in Geneva.

The bridge connecting Geneva’s left and right banks is more than a popular selfie spot for tourists – it's also a powerful symbol of collaboration. Since 2019, the Geneva sustainable finance community came together to organise Building Bridges. The aim of this international event is to foster connections between the international organisations on Geneva's right bank and the financial institutions clustered on its left bank. This event, of which the Geneva Financial Center is one of the "Founding Parners", contributes to highlight the financial centre’s expertise in sustainable investing.

Among the best

according to the 

World Economic Forum

Geneva Financial Center