Swiss franc coin with red and silver architectural ribbons

Swiss franc · Business models

CHF stablecoin
business models

Seven business models for Swiss-franc stablecoins under FINMA supervision and the BankG / FinIA (FinIG) framework. Each model is described with the same three-step method: a morphological box for the design space, a stablecoin canvas for the business logic, and a spider chart for the decision.

Explore the models Compare scores

+ 01

Morphological box — the WHAT

Nine design layers with all available expressions. A business model is a path across the rows; the highlighted cells show the path taken.

+ 02

Stablecoin canvas — the HOW

Nine dimensions adapted from the Business Model Canvas to stablecoin issuance — value proposition, reserves, regulation, revenue, cost, risk and partners.

+ 03

Spider chart — the WHETHER

Every model is scored 1–5 on interoperability, operational complexity, risk, regulatory feasibility and economic viability.

The seven models — grouped into three categories

The models fall into three groups that differ fundamentally in counterparty, ticket size and revenue logic: wholesale and institutional flows, consumer and retail payments, and models where the token itself is the product. The infrastructure category also includes two extensions assessed with the same method: recurring & usage-based payments (6.2), and marketplace settlement with split payments (6.3).

+ Wholesale

Large amounts, professional counterparties, bank-grade rails. The CHF token moves money between companies, banks and trading venues — high tickets, tight controls, clear licensing under the issuing bank.

01Treasury Management — Intercompany TransferProgrammable CHF liquidity transfers between group companies for cash concentration, funding and settlement.
02Cross-border payments — B2B24/7 CHF settlement leg for corporate and interbank cross-border flows.
04Digital-asset trading — B2BCHF cash leg for institutional trading, settlement and collateral.

+ Retail

Many small payments by private individuals — remittances, crypto on/off-ramps, everyday spending at the point of sale. High per-user onboarding and support effort, competition with established low-fee Swiss rails.

03Cross-border payments — B2CRemittances and consumer transfers with a CHF leg at retail scale.
05Digital-asset trading — B2CCHF on/off-ramp and quote currency for retail crypto investors.
07B2C payments at the point of sale — with supplementary servicesEveryday CHF spending at merchants, monetised through value-added services.

+ Infrastructure

The token itself is the product: a neutral settlement asset that other providers build on — shared rails, common standards and joint governance rather than a single issuer's own customer proposition. Two assessed extensions show what gets built on top: recurring or usage-based billing (6.2), and marketplace settlement with split payments (6.3).

6.1CHF stablecoin as payment infrastructureA neutral settlement asset that other providers build payment products on.
6.2Recurring & usage-based paymentsAuthorised once, then paid on schedule or by measured usage — no manual transfer for every bill.
6.3Marketplace settlement & split paymentsOne customer payment, automatically allocated among seller, marketplace and partners — held until fulfilment, then split by rule.

MODEL 01Wholesale

Treasury Management — Intercompany Transfer

Programmable CHF liquidity transfers between group companies for cash concentration, funding and settlement.

User / consumer assumptions

Each participating subsidiary can hold and transfer the CHF token under the group's approved treasury policy.
A token transfer produces a legally effective intercompany payment and an auditable accounting entry in every relevant jurisdiction.
The token remains redeemable 1:1 for CHF, including during treasury peaks and outside conventional banking hours.
ERP and treasury-management systems can automate liquidity sweeps, approvals, reconciliation and intercompany loan records.
Tax, transfer-pricing and capital-control requirements are checked before value moves across legal entities.

Who is already doing this

J.P. Morgan Kinexys (formerly Onyx) — JPM Coin moves USD/EUR intraday and 24/7 between corporate subsidiaries; Siemens and other corporates use it for intercompany transfers.
Siemens Treasury — piloted blockchain-based intercompany liquidity management and was an early user of J.P. Morgan's deposit-token rails.
Ant International — runs a proprietary blockchain treasury platform (Whale) for real-time intercompany funding across its global entities.

1. Morphological box — the design space

Issuer typeWho carries the claim	Licensed bank (BankG)	Fintech licence (Art. 1b BankG)	Trust / SPV with bank guarantee	Fund vehicle (FINMA-supervised)	Consortium / joint venture
Legal nature of claimWhat the holder actually owns	Deposit claim (on-balance-sheet)	E-money-style claim (off-balance-sheet)	Fund unit / share	Bearer note / debt instrument	Beneficial interest in a trust
Reserve compositionBacking quality	SNB sight deposits (100%)	CHF cash + short Confederation bonds	CHF money-market instruments	Diversified HQLA with duration ladder	Over-collateralised crypto / RWA
Yield treatmentWho keeps the carry	No yield to holder (issuer keeps carry)	Rebasing / accruing to holder	NAV-appreciating token	Tiered: retail 0, institutional pass-through	Rebates to merchants / distributors
Redemption & liquidityConvertibility to CHF	T+0 at par, 24/7	T+0 banking hours	T+1 / T+2 settlement	Gated with notice period	Secondary-market exit only
Ledger & interoperabilityWhere value is recorded	Public permissionless L1	Public L2 / rollup	Permissioned DLT (e.g. SDX)	Hybrid: permissioned mint, public circulation	Multi-chain with canonical bridge
Custody modelHow holders keep the token	Self-custody wallet	Regulated custodian	Bank-integrated wallet	MPC / smart-contract account	Omnibus with sub-ledger
Access & distributionWho may hold and where it is sold	Retail open access	Whitelisted retail (KYC at wallet level)	Professional investors only	Institutional / interbank only	Merchant / PSP acceptance network
Regulatory anchorSupervisory perimeter	Banking licence	Fintech licence (Art. 1b BankG)	Bank-guarantee exemption (FINMA GN 06/2024)	FinIA/FinIG authorisation (securities firm / manager)	Future dedicated stablecoin regime (consultation 22 Oct 2025)

Bank-issued deposit token for institutional group entities, backed by CHF cash and short Confederation bonds, with instant redemption, omnibus treasury custody and controlled circulation on a hybrid ledger.

2. Stablecoin canvas — the business model

Value proposition

24/7 CHF liquidity movement between subsidiaries and treasury centres
Automated cash concentration, zero-balancing and just-in-time funding
Less trapped cash and fewer external bank transfers
Shared transaction record for treasury, accounting and audit

Holder / user segments

Multinational corporate treasury centres
Swiss parent companies with foreign subsidiaries
Group finance, accounting and shared-service teams
Regulated financial groups moving liquidity between legal entities

Trust & reserve architecture

Bank-issued CHF deposit token with segregated operational liquidity
CHF cash and short Confederation bonds sized for daily sweep peaks
Group-level limits by entity, currency, corridor and purpose
Continuous reconciliation between token balances and bank records

Regulatory anchor

Banking licence for issuance and redemption
AMLA/KYC applied to each participating legal entity and authorised wallet
Intercompany loan, capital-control and local payment rules assessed per corridor
Documented tax and transfer-pricing treatment for balances and interest

Distribution channels

Treasury-management system and ERP integrations
Bank corporate portal and treasury API
Whitelisted institutional wallets with role-based approvals
Automated cash-pool and payment-factory workflows

Revenue logic

Enterprise subscription and implementation fee
Per-transfer or per-entity platform charge
FX spread when subsidiaries fund or redeem in another currency
Reserve carry and premium fees for 24/7 liquidity

Cost logic

ERP/TMS integration and entity onboarding
24/7 liquidity, reconciliation and support operations
Legal, tax and transfer-pricing analysis by jurisdiction
Wallet controls, cybersecurity and smart-contract assurance

Risk & controls

Dual approval, role segregation and entity-specific transfer limits
Whitelisted wallets and purpose-coded transfers
Real-time sanctions, anomaly and liquidity monitoring
Legal controls for intercompany loans, dividends and capital restrictions
Fallback redemption and conventional-payment procedures

Key partners

Issuing and reserve bank
Corporate treasury, tax, legal and audit teams
ERP and treasury-management system vendors
Regulated custodians, wallet and identity providers

3. Participant data & value flow

Implementation sequence showing who sends what to whom.

Step 01Instruction / data
ParticipantSending subsidiary
Submits a purpose-coded sweep or funding request with the required approvals.
ParticipantGroup treasury / TMS
Step 02Instruction / data
ParticipantGroup treasury / TMS
Sends the approved payment instruction and intercompany accounting details through the treasury API.
ParticipantIssuing bank
Step 03CHF stablecoin
ParticipantIssuing bank
Checks wallet permissions and limits, then moves the CHF deposit token between the subsidiaries’ accounts.
ParticipantReceiving subsidiary
Step 04Confirmation / control
ParticipantIssuing bank
Returns finality, transaction reference and balance updates for automatic reconciliation.
ParticipantBoth subsidiaries and group treasury
Step 05Fiat / reserves
ParticipantIssuing bank
Rebalances aggregate CHF cash and short-bond liquidity for minting, redemption and daily sweep peaks.
ParticipantReserve portfolio
Step 06Confirmation / control
ParticipantGroup treasury
Posts the intercompany loan or settlement entry with its immutable transaction reference.
ParticipantAccounting, tax and audit

End-to-end process, simplified

Sending subsidiaryGroup treasury / TMSIssuing bankReceiving subsidiary

The condensed chain of who hands what to whom; confirmation, reconciliation and reserve-management steps run alongside and are shown in the list above.

4. Spider chart — the evaluation

Scoring against the shared criteria grid

A strong institutional use case with measurable working-capital benefits: controlled participation and bank issuance make it feasible, while cross-border tax, accounting and intercompany-loan treatment are the main implementation constraints.

Interoperability4 / 5
Interoperability 4 — Standard treasury APIs, ERP connectors and a hybrid ledger let approved subsidiaries transact through familiar workflows, although access remains intentionally restricted to the corporate group and its banks.
Operational complexity3 / 5
Operational complexity 3 — A limited number of known legal entities simplifies onboarding, but multi-jurisdiction tax rules, approval matrices, reconciliation and 24/7 liquidity still require substantial integration and governance.
Risk4 / 5
Risk 4 — Full backing, whitelisted wallets, dual approval and group-level limits keep credit and fraud exposure low; residual risk lies in key management, erroneous transfers and the legal character of cross-border intercompany balances.
Regulatory feasibility4 / 5
Regulatory feasibility 4 — Bank issuance has a clear Swiss licence path and closed-group distribution reduces retail concerns, while each corridor still needs analysis of AML, capital controls, intercompany lending, tax and transfer pricing.
Economic viability4 / 5
Economic viability 4 — Large recurring balances, measurable reductions in trapped cash and bank fees, and enterprise integration revenue create strong economics for groups with sufficient cross-entity CHF flows.

MODEL 02Wholesale

Cross-border payments — B2B

24/7 CHF settlement leg for corporate and interbank cross-border flows.

User / consumer assumptions

The CHF leg settles outside SIC hours with the same finality as a bank transfer.
Counterparties are pre-approved institutions, so settlement risk is low.
FX conversion into or out of CHF is transparent and cheaper than correspondent-banking routes.
The treasury team can integrate the token into its existing ERP/TMS workflows.

Who is already doing this

Partior (DBS, J.P. Morgan, Temasek) — multi-currency blockchain settlement for interbank B2B payments, live with USD, EUR, SGD.
J.P. Morgan Kinexys — programmable cross-border corporate payments settling billions of USD-equivalent daily.
Fnality — central-bank-money-backed wholesale payment chain (GBP live, USD/EUR in progress) for interbank settlement.

1. Morphological box — the design space

Issuer typeWho carries the claim	Licensed bank (BankG)	Fintech licence (Art. 1b BankG)	Trust / SPV with bank guarantee	Fund vehicle (FINMA-supervised)	Consortium / joint venture
Legal nature of claimWhat the holder actually owns	Deposit claim (on-balance-sheet)	E-money-style claim (off-balance-sheet)	Fund unit / share	Bearer note / debt instrument	Beneficial interest in a trust
Reserve compositionBacking quality	SNB sight deposits (100%)	CHF cash + short Confederation bonds	CHF money-market instruments	Diversified HQLA with duration ladder	Over-collateralised crypto / RWA
Yield treatmentWho keeps the carry	No yield to holder (issuer keeps carry)	Rebasing / accruing to holder	NAV-appreciating token	Tiered: retail 0, institutional pass-through	Rebates to merchants / distributors
Redemption & liquidityConvertibility to CHF	T+0 at par, 24/7	T+0 banking hours	T+1 / T+2 settlement	Gated with notice period	Secondary-market exit only
Ledger & interoperabilityWhere value is recorded	Public permissionless L1	Public L2 / rollup	Permissioned DLT (e.g. SDX)	Hybrid: permissioned mint, public circulation	Multi-chain with canonical bridge
Custody modelHow holders keep the token	Self-custody wallet	Regulated custodian	Bank-integrated wallet	MPC / smart-contract account	Omnibus with sub-ledger
Access & distributionWho may hold and where it is sold	Retail open access	Whitelisted retail (KYC at wallet level)	Professional investors only	Institutional / interbank only	Merchant / PSP acceptance network
Regulatory anchorSupervisory perimeter	Banking licence	Fintech licence (Art. 1b BankG)	Bank-guarantee exemption (FINMA GN 06/2024)	FinIA/FinIG authorisation (securities firm / manager)	Future dedicated stablecoin regime (consultation 22 Oct 2025)

Bank or consortium issuance with omnibus sub-ledger custody, institutional access, instant par redemption and tiered yield pass-through to treasury clients.

2. Stablecoin canvas — the business model

Value proposition

Same-day CHF settlement outside SIC operating hours
Removal of correspondent-banking layers and nostro pre-funding
Programmable payment-versus-payment with USD/EUR stablecoins
Transparent fees and traceable payment status

Holder / user segments

Swiss exporters and multinational treasuries
Commodity traders and freight/logistics payers
Foreign banks needing a CHF leg

Trust & reserve architecture

CHF cash plus short Confederation bonds
Intraday liquidity buffers for settlement peaks
Daily reserve reporting to institutional users

Regulatory anchor

Banking licence; AMLA-compliant travel rule
Sanctions screening at mint, transfer and redemption
Cross-border recognition with counterpart regimes

Distribution channels

Bank corporate portals and treasury APIs
ERP / TMS connectors (SAP, Coupa)
Interbank liquidity providers

Revenue logic

FX spread on CHF/USD/EUR conversion
Per-transaction settlement fee
Float and reserve carry
Premium SLA and API tiers

Cost logic

Liquidity provisioning in each corridor
Compliance and sanctions operations
Integration engineering per corporate client

Risk & controls

Corridor liquidity and FX risk
Sanctions and correspondent de-risking
Operational settlement-failure playbooks

Key partners

Market makers and FX desks
Foreign stablecoin issuers for the other leg
Custodians and ERP vendors

3. Participant data & value flow

Implementation sequence showing who sends what to whom.

Step 01Instruction / data
ParticipantCorporate payer
Sends invoice, beneficiary, corridor and travel-rule data from its ERP or treasury system.
ParticipantIssuing bank / consortium
Step 02CHF stablecoin
ParticipantIssuing bank / consortium
Screens the payment, then debits or transfers the payer’s CHF tokens.
ParticipantCHF settlement ledger
Step 03CHF stablecoin
ParticipantCHF settlement ledger
Exchanges the CHF leg against foreign fiat or a foreign-currency token through PvP where available.
ParticipantFX provider / foreign issuer
Step 04Fiat / reserves
ParticipantFX provider / foreign issuer
Delivers the destination currency through the local banking or token settlement rail.
ParticipantBeneficiary bank
Step 05Confirmation / control
ParticipantBeneficiary bank
Credits the beneficiary and returns final settlement status to both sides.
ParticipantBeneficiary company
Step 06Confirmation / control
ParticipantIssuers and banks
Reconcile reserves, corridor liquidity, sanctions results and transaction references.
ParticipantTreasury and compliance records

End-to-end process, simplified

Corporate payerIssuing bank / consortiumCHF settlement ledgerFX providerBeneficiary bankBeneficiary company

The condensed chain of who hands what to whom; confirmation, reconciliation and reserve-management steps run alongside and are shown in the list above.

4. Spider chart — the evaluation

Scoring against the shared criteria grid

Strongest near-term commercial case: high ticket sizes, real pain in correspondent banking, and clear supervisory home — but corridor liquidity is operationally demanding.

Interoperability4 / 5
Interoperability 4 — Combines a public L2 leg with banking rails, ERP connectors and whitelisted venues, so corporate treasuries can settle without leaving their existing stack.
Operational complexity2 / 5
Operational complexity 2 — Corridor liquidity, FX hedging, nostro replacement and 24/7 market-making across time zones make this operationally heavy despite a simple token design.
Risk4 / 5
Risk 4 — Institutional counterparties and full backing keep credit risk low; the open exposures are corridor liquidity gaps and settlement timing on the foreign leg.
Regulatory feasibility4 / 5
Regulatory feasibility 4 — Bank or consortium issuance sits inside BankG/FinIA with a clear supervisory home; complexity comes from foreign-leg licensing, not Swiss law.
Economic viability4 / 5
Economic viability 4 — High ticket sizes, measurable savings against correspondent banking and tiered yield pass-through give real willingness to pay.

MODEL 03Retail

Cross-border payments — B2C

Remittances and consumer transfers with a CHF leg at retail scale.

User / consumer assumptions

Sending CHF abroad is cheaper and faster than a traditional bank transfer or money-transfer operator.
The recipient can cash out easily into local currency through familiar payout rails.
The sender does not need a Swiss bank account — a mobile wallet and ID check are enough.
Fees are disclosed upfront and the FX rate is fair.

Who is already doing this

Circle (USDC) + MoneyGram / Stripe — stablecoin-powered remittances and payouts to consumers across borders.
Ripple Payments — banks and fintechs (e.g. Tranglo, Novatti) settle remittances with XRP/stablecoin rails in Asia and Africa.
Paysafe / Checkout.com with Fireblocks — merchants and payout providers offering USDC settlement for consumer payouts.

1. Morphological box — the design space

Issuer typeWho carries the claim	Licensed bank (BankG)	Fintech licence (Art. 1b BankG)	Trust / SPV with bank guarantee	Fund vehicle (FINMA-supervised)	Consortium / joint venture
Legal nature of claimWhat the holder actually owns	Deposit claim (on-balance-sheet)	E-money-style claim (off-balance-sheet)	Fund unit / share	Bearer note / debt instrument	Beneficial interest in a trust
Reserve compositionBacking quality	SNB sight deposits (100%)	CHF cash + short Confederation bonds	CHF money-market instruments	Diversified HQLA with duration ladder	Over-collateralised crypto / RWA
Yield treatmentWho keeps the carry	No yield to holder (issuer keeps carry)	Rebasing / accruing to holder	NAV-appreciating token	Tiered: retail 0, institutional pass-through	Rebates to merchants / distributors
Redemption & liquidityConvertibility to CHF	T+0 at par, 24/7	T+0 banking hours	T+1 / T+2 settlement	Gated with notice period	Secondary-market exit only
Ledger & interoperabilityWhere value is recorded	Public permissionless L1	Public L2 / rollup	Permissioned DLT (e.g. SDX)	Hybrid: permissioned mint, public circulation	Multi-chain with canonical bridge
Custody modelHow holders keep the token	Self-custody wallet	Regulated custodian	Bank-integrated wallet	MPC / smart-contract account	Omnibus with sub-ledger
Access & distributionWho may hold and where it is sold	Retail open access	Whitelisted retail (KYC at wallet level)	Professional investors only	Institutional / interbank only	Merchant / PSP acceptance network
Regulatory anchorSupervisory perimeter	Banking licence	Fintech licence (Art. 1b BankG)	Bank-guarantee exemption (FINMA GN 06/2024)	FinIA/FinIG authorisation (securities firm / manager)	Future dedicated stablecoin regime (consultation 22 Oct 2025)

Fintech-licensed e-money-style claim on a public L2, smart-contract accounts, whitelisted retail access, no yield to holder.

2. Stablecoin canvas — the business model

Value proposition

Low-cost remittances from Switzerland at near-instant speed
Transparent FX with no hidden margin
Works without a Swiss bank account
Mobile-first send and cash-out experience

Holder / user segments

Migrant workers sending money home
Cross-border commuters and students
Swiss residents paying foreign obligations

Trust & reserve architecture

CHF cash and short bonds held with a custodian bank
Client-money segregation under the fintech licence
Public attestations for consumer trust

Regulatory anchor

Fintech licence (Art. 1b BankG), CHF 100m deposit cap
Full AMLA onboarding, sanctions and travel-rule
Consumer-protection and pricing disclosure duties

Distribution channels

Own mobile app and wallet partners
Cash-in/cash-out agent networks abroad
Local payout rails (UPI, PIX, mobile money)

Revenue logic

FX margin
Flat send fee
Cash-out partner revenue share
Reserve carry

Cost logic

Customer acquisition and support
KYC per user (high volume, low ticket)
Payout-partner and on-chain fees

Risk & controls

Fraud, mule accounts and social-engineering scams
Thin margin per transaction
Reputational and consumer-protection exposure

Key partners

Payout networks abroad
KYC/AML vendors
Wallet and telco distribution partners

3. Participant data & value flow

Implementation sequence showing who sends what to whom.

Step 01Instruction / data
ParticipantSender
Enters the recipient, amount and payout method; the app supplies identity and transfer data.
ParticipantWallet / fintech issuer
Step 02CHF stablecoin
ParticipantWallet / fintech issuer
Completes fraud, AML and sanctions checks, then transfers the CHF token.
ParticipantPublic settlement layer
Step 03CHF stablecoin
ParticipantPublic settlement layer
Routes the token to the approved partner serving the destination country.
ParticipantFX and payout partner
Step 04Fiat / reserves
ParticipantFX and payout partner
Converts CHF value and sends local currency through a bank, mobile-money network or cash agent.
ParticipantLocal payout rail
Step 05Fiat / reserves
ParticipantLocal payout rail
Credits the recipient’s account or makes cash available for collection.
ParticipantRecipient
Step 06Confirmation / control
ParticipantPayout partner
Returns payout confirmation; the issuer reconciles partner settlement against segregated reserves.
ParticipantSender and issuer

End-to-end process, simplified

SenderWallet / fintech issuerPublic settlement layerFX & payout partnerLocal payout railRecipient

The condensed chain of who hands what to whom; confirmation, reconciliation and reserve-management steps run alongside and are shown in the list above.

4. Spider chart — the evaluation

Scoring against the shared criteria grid

Large addressable market but the hardest unit economics: per-user KYC and support costs dominate, so scale and cheap distribution decide viability.

Interoperability4 / 5
Interoperability 4 — Wallet, telco and payout-network distribution plus public-chain settlement give broad consumer reach across corridors.
Operational complexity2 / 5
Operational complexity 2 — Per-user onboarding, sanctions screening, fraud monitoring, support and last-mile payout partners in each destination country dominate the run cost.
Risk3 / 5
Risk 3 — Retail AML, fraud and consumer-protection exposure is materially higher than in B2B, even with full reserve backing.
Regulatory feasibility3 / 5
Regulatory feasibility 3 — Swiss issuance is workable, but retail distribution triggers consumer-protection duties and licensing in every receiving jurisdiction.
Economic viability3 / 5
Economic viability 3 — A very large addressable market with thin per-transaction margins; only cheap distribution and scale make the unit economics close.

MODEL 04Wholesale

Digital-asset trading — B2B

CHF cash leg for institutional trading, settlement and collateral.

User / consumer assumptions

The token can be used as settlement currency on regulated trading venues and for collateral.
Settlement is atomic against tokenised securities, removing counterparty exposure.
Liquidity is deep enough to enter and exit large positions without material slippage.
All participants and venues are regulated, so legal finality and custody are reliable.

Who is already doing this

SIX Digital Exchange (SDX) — regulated institutional exchange and CSD settling tokenised bonds against a CHF wholesale-CBDC pilot (Project Helvetia III) with UBS, ZKB and others.
Taurus — Swiss FINMA-regulated platform where banks (e.g. Deutsche Bank, State Street partnerships) custody and trade tokenised assets.
Broadridge DLR — institutional repo settlement on DLT processing over USD 1 trillion per month.

1. Morphological box — the design space

Issuer typeWho carries the claim	Licensed bank (BankG)	Fintech licence (Art. 1b BankG)	Trust / SPV with bank guarantee	Fund vehicle (FINMA-supervised)	Consortium / joint venture
Legal nature of claimWhat the holder actually owns	Deposit claim (on-balance-sheet)	E-money-style claim (off-balance-sheet)	Fund unit / share	Bearer note / debt instrument	Beneficial interest in a trust
Reserve compositionBacking quality	SNB sight deposits (100%)	CHF cash + short Confederation bonds	CHF money-market instruments	Diversified HQLA with duration ladder	Over-collateralised crypto / RWA
Yield treatmentWho keeps the carry	No yield to holder (issuer keeps carry)	Rebasing / accruing to holder	NAV-appreciating token	Tiered: retail 0, institutional pass-through	Rebates to merchants / distributors
Redemption & liquidityConvertibility to CHF	T+0 at par, 24/7	T+0 banking hours	T+1 / T+2 settlement	Gated with notice period	Secondary-market exit only
Ledger & interoperabilityWhere value is recorded	Public permissionless L1	Public L2 / rollup	Permissioned DLT (e.g. SDX)	Hybrid: permissioned mint, public circulation	Multi-chain with canonical bridge
Custody modelHow holders keep the token	Self-custody wallet	Regulated custodian	Bank-integrated wallet	MPC / smart-contract account	Omnibus with sub-ledger
Access & distributionWho may hold and where it is sold	Retail open access	Whitelisted retail (KYC at wallet level)	Professional investors only	Institutional / interbank only	Merchant / PSP acceptance network
Regulatory anchorSupervisory perimeter	Banking licence	Fintech licence (Art. 1b BankG)	Bank-guarantee exemption (FINMA GN 06/2024)	FinIA/FinIG authorisation (securities firm / manager)	Future dedicated stablecoin regime (consultation 22 Oct 2025)

Bank issuance on permissioned DLT with omnibus sub-ledger, money-market reserves, professional/institutional access and FinIA-authorised trading counterparties.

2. Stablecoin canvas — the business model

Value proposition

Atomic DvP against tokenised securities in CHF
Collateral mobility and intraday margining, 24/7
Elimination of settlement latency and counterparty exposure
Yield pass-through on idle trading balances

Holder / user segments

Regulated exchanges and MTFs (SDX, BX Digital)
Prime brokers, market makers and crypto funds
Banks running tokenised-securities desks

Trust & reserve architecture

CHF money-market instruments with daily liquidity
Reserve reporting synchronised with trading cycles
Failover custody and settlement-finality guarantees

Regulatory anchor

Banking licence for issuance
FinIA/FinIG authorisation across the trading value chain
DLT Act framework for ledger-based securities

Distribution channels

Exchange and CSD integrations
Prime-broker and custodian connectivity
FIX / REST settlement APIs

Revenue logic

Reserve carry on trading balances
Settlement and mint/redeem fees
Collateral-mobility service fees

Cost logic

Venue and CSD integration engineering
24/7 operations and settlement support
Capital held against intraday exposures

Risk & controls

Concentration in a few venues
Intraday liquidity and margin-call spikes
Smart-contract and finality risk

Key partners

SDX / regulated venues
Custodians and prime brokers
Market makers

3. Participant data & value flow

Implementation sequence showing who sends what to whom.

Step 01Instruction / data
ParticipantTrading counterparties
Submit matched trade instructions defining the tokenised security and CHF cash legs.
ParticipantRegulated venue / CSD
Step 02CHF stablecoin
ParticipantIssuing bank
Allocates CHF tokens after checking the buyer’s funding and reserve availability.
ParticipantBuyer’s venue wallet
Step 03Instruction / data
ParticipantBuyer and seller wallets
Lock the CHF tokens and tokenised securities for atomic delivery-versus-payment.
ParticipantVenue settlement contract
Step 04CHF stablecoin
ParticipantVenue settlement contract
Transfers the security and CHF token simultaneously, or transfers neither leg.
ParticipantBuyer and seller
Step 05Confirmation / control
ParticipantRegulated venue / CSD
Confirms legal finality and updates custody, collateral and position records.
ParticipantCounterparties and custodians
Step 06Fiat / reserves
ParticipantIssuing bank
Reconciles token supply, money-market reserves and intraday liquidity buffers.
ParticipantReserve and risk ledgers

End-to-end process, simplified

Trading counterpartiesIssuing bankRegulated venue / CSDAtomic DvP settlementBuyer & seller

The condensed chain of who hands what to whom; confirmation, reconciliation and reserve-management steps run alongside and are shown in the list above.

4. Spider chart — the evaluation

Scoring against the shared criteria grid

Clear supervisory home and healthy economics on institutional balances; growth is bounded by tokenised-securities volumes rather than by regulation.

Interoperability3 / 5
Interoperability 3 — Deep integration with regulated venues, custodians and prime brokers, but deliberately restricted to permissioned settlement environments.
Operational complexity3 / 5
Operational complexity 3 — Institutional-only access keeps onboarding volumes low; the work sits in DvP integration, venue connectivity and intraday liquidity.
Risk4 / 5
Risk 4 — Professional counterparties, whitelisted transfers and atomic DvP settlement remove most settlement and counterparty risk; smart-contract and finality risk remain.
Regulatory feasibility4 / 5
Regulatory feasibility 4 — Serves regulated venues under an established FinIA/DLT-Act perimeter with a clear supervisory home.
Economic viability4 / 5
Economic viability 4 — Healthy income on large institutional balances and venue fees; the ceiling is set by tokenised-securities volumes, not by cost.

MODEL 05Retail

Digital-asset trading — B2C

CHF on/off-ramp and quote currency for retail crypto investors.

User / consumer assumptions

The stablecoin is always exchangeable 1:1 for CHF on the partner exchange or bank account.
CHF trading pairs are liquid enough to avoid hidden FX costs.
The issuer and its bank guarantee provide the same comfort as a Swiss-regulated product.
Onboarding is no harder than opening a standard Swiss crypto exchange account.

Who is already doing this

Kraken / Binance — retail exchanges where CHF pairs are marginal but stablecoins (USDC, USDT) dominate retail trading flows.
Bitcoin Suisse / Swissquote — Swiss retail brokers offering crypto trading with CHF funding, candidates for a CHF settlement token.
Crypto.com — retail trading app settling in stablecoins across jurisdictions.

1. Morphological box — the design space

Issuer typeWho carries the claim	Licensed bank (BankG)	Fintech licence (Art. 1b BankG)	Trust / SPV with bank guarantee	Fund vehicle (FINMA-supervised)	Consortium / joint venture
Legal nature of claimWhat the holder actually owns	Deposit claim (on-balance-sheet)	E-money-style claim (off-balance-sheet)	Fund unit / share	Bearer note / debt instrument	Beneficial interest in a trust
Reserve compositionBacking quality	SNB sight deposits (100%)	CHF cash + short Confederation bonds	CHF money-market instruments	Diversified HQLA with duration ladder	Over-collateralised crypto / RWA
Yield treatmentWho keeps the carry	No yield to holder (issuer keeps carry)	Rebasing / accruing to holder	NAV-appreciating token	Tiered: retail 0, institutional pass-through	Rebates to merchants / distributors
Redemption & liquidityConvertibility to CHF	T+0 at par, 24/7	T+0 banking hours	T+1 / T+2 settlement	Gated with notice period	Secondary-market exit only
Ledger & interoperabilityWhere value is recorded	Public permissionless L1	Public L2 / rollup	Permissioned DLT (e.g. SDX)	Hybrid: permissioned mint, public circulation	Multi-chain with canonical bridge
Custody modelHow holders keep the token	Self-custody wallet	Regulated custodian	Bank-integrated wallet	MPC / smart-contract account	Omnibus with sub-ledger
Access & distributionWho may hold and where it is sold	Retail open access	Whitelisted retail (KYC at wallet level)	Professional investors only	Institutional / interbank only	Merchant / PSP acceptance network
Regulatory anchorSupervisory perimeter	Banking licence	Fintech licence (Art. 1b BankG)	Bank-guarantee exemption (FINMA GN 06/2024)	FinIA/FinIG authorisation (securities firm / manager)	Future dedicated stablecoin regime (consultation 22 Oct 2025)

Trust/SPV issuer under a bank guarantee, public L2 circulation, whitelisted retail access, no yield to holder, T+0 par redemption.

2. Stablecoin canvas — the business model

Value proposition

Stay in CHF between trades instead of routing through USD
No FX round-trip cost for Swiss retail investors
Instant on/off-ramp to Swiss bank accounts
Familiar, regulated Swiss counterparty

Holder / user segments

Swiss retail crypto investors
Neobank and broker customers adding crypto
DeFi users seeking a CHF-denominated pair

Trust & reserve architecture

CHF cash and short bonds under a bank guarantee
FINMA Guidance 06/2024 default-guarantee structure
Frequent public attestation for retail trust

Regulatory anchor

Bank-guarantee exemption (FINMA GN 06/2024)
Exchange partners under FinIA/FinIG authorisation
Retail suitability and disclosure duties

Distribution channels

Swiss and international exchanges
Neobank and broker apps
Wallet integrations and DeFi liquidity pools

Revenue logic

Reserve carry (issuer keeps it)
Listing and liquidity partnerships
On/off-ramp spread shared with venues

Cost logic

Guarantee fee to the guaranteeing bank
Market making to keep CHF pairs liquid
Retail support and compliance

Risk & controls

Thin CHF-pair liquidity leading to depeg optics
Retail conduct and mis-selling exposure
Dependence on venue listings

Key partners

Guaranteeing bank
Exchanges and market makers
Wallet providers and auditors

3. Participant data & value flow

Implementation sequence showing who sends what to whom.

Step 01Fiat / reserves
ParticipantRetail investor
Funds the trading account in CHF and requests conversion into the CHF stablecoin.
ParticipantExchange / broker
Step 02Instruction / data
ParticipantExchange / broker
Passes the mint request after completing customer and source-of-funds checks.
ParticipantIssuer and guaranteeing bank
Step 03CHF stablecoin
ParticipantIssuer
Mints tokens against protected CHF cash and short-bond reserves.
ParticipantInvestor’s exchange wallet
Step 04CHF stablecoin
ParticipantInvestor
Uses the token to buy or sell digital assets in CHF-denominated pairs.
ParticipantMarket maker / trading venue
Step 05Confirmation / control
ParticipantTrading venue
Confirms execution and updates the investor’s asset and CHF-token balances.
ParticipantInvestor
Step 06Fiat / reserves
ParticipantIssuer / guaranteeing bank
Burns redeemed tokens and releases CHF; reserve attestations independently confirm backing.
ParticipantInvestor’s bank account

End-to-end process, simplified

Retail investorExchange / brokerIssuer & guaranteeing bankInvestor's CHF-token walletTrading venueRedemption to bank account

The condensed chain of who hands what to whom; confirmation, reconciliation and reserve-management steps run alongside and are shown in the list above.

4. Spider chart — the evaluation

Scoring against the shared criteria grid

Regulatorily well-trodden via the bank-guarantee route, but CHF pairs are shallow: the model lives or dies on exchange listings and market-making cost.

Interoperability4 / 5
Interoperability 4 — Listed on public chains and major exchanges with broad wallet support, giving retail traders a CHF settlement asset wherever they trade.
Operational complexity3 / 5
Operational complexity 3 — Token operations are standard, but exchange listings, market-making agreements and retail support add continuous overhead.
Risk3 / 5
Risk 3 — Retail conduct risk, volatile redemption flows and dependence on exchange counterparties offset the fully backed reserve.
Regulatory feasibility4 / 5
Regulatory feasibility 4 — The bank-guarantee route is well-trodden in Switzerland and gives a predictable path for a retail-facing payment token.
Economic viability2 / 5
Economic viability 2 — CHF trading pairs are shallow; listing fees and market-making cost can exceed the spread and reserve income earned.

MODEL 6.1Infrastructure

CHF stablecoin as payment infrastructure

A neutral settlement asset that other providers build payment products on.

User / consumer assumptions

The settlement layer is open, reliable and cheaper than existing card or account-to-account rails.
Enough banks, PSPs and platforms adopt it so the network reaches critical mass.
Developers can integrate via standard APIs and SDKs without building a full bank stack.
Governance among consortium members keeps the rules stable and non-discriminatory.

Who is already doing this

Fnality — consortium of ~20 global banks (UBS, Barclays, HSBC, Santander…) building shared central-bank-money-backed settlement chains.
SDX — SIX-owned, bank-backed digital market infrastructure issuing CHF-denominated digital bonds with DvP settlement.
Partior — bank consortium operating shared multi-currency payment infrastructure as a utility.

1. Morphological box — the design space

Issuer typeWho carries the claim	Licensed bank (BankG)	Fintech licence (Art. 1b BankG)	Trust / SPV with bank guarantee	Fund vehicle (FINMA-supervised)	Consortium / joint venture
Legal nature of claimWhat the holder actually owns	Deposit claim (on-balance-sheet)	E-money-style claim (off-balance-sheet)	Fund unit / share	Bearer note / debt instrument	Beneficial interest in a trust
Reserve compositionBacking quality	SNB sight deposits (100%)	CHF cash + short Confederation bonds	CHF money-market instruments	Diversified HQLA with duration ladder	Over-collateralised crypto / RWA
Yield treatmentWho keeps the carry	No yield to holder (issuer keeps carry)	Rebasing / accruing to holder	NAV-appreciating token	Tiered: retail 0, institutional pass-through	Rebates to merchants / distributors
Redemption & liquidityConvertibility to CHF	T+0 at par, 24/7	T+0 banking hours	T+1 / T+2 settlement	Gated with notice period	Secondary-market exit only
Ledger & interoperabilityWhere value is recorded	Public permissionless L1	Public L2 / rollup	Permissioned DLT (e.g. SDX)	Hybrid: permissioned mint, public circulation	Multi-chain with canonical bridge
Custody modelHow holders keep the token	Self-custody wallet	Regulated custodian	Bank-integrated wallet	MPC / smart-contract account	Omnibus with sub-ledger
Access & distributionWho may hold and where it is sold	Retail open access	Whitelisted retail (KYC at wallet level)	Professional investors only	Institutional / interbank only	Merchant / PSP acceptance network
Regulatory anchorSupervisory perimeter	Banking licence	Fintech licence (Art. 1b BankG)	Bank-guarantee exemption (FINMA GN 06/2024)	FinIA/FinIG authorisation (securities firm / manager)	Future dedicated stablecoin regime (consultation 22 Oct 2025)

Consortium issuance (banks + PSPs), e-money-style claim, hybrid ledger, distribution through a merchant/PSP acceptance network, rebates to distributors.

2. Stablecoin canvas — the business model

Value proposition

Neutral, shared CHF settlement layer for PSPs, banks and platforms
Programmable money: escrow, split payments, streaming, machine-to-machine
Lower cost than card rails for account-to-account flows
Open SDK — others build the end-user experience

Holder / user segments

PSPs, acquirers and platform marketplaces
Payroll, insurance and gig platforms
IoT / machine-payment and B2B software vendors

Trust & reserve architecture

CHF cash plus short Confederation bonds
Governance shared across consortium members
Real-time reserve dashboard for participants

Regulatory anchor

Consortium bank licence or fintech licence
Potential systemic-importance oversight at scale
Consultation draft of 22 Oct 2025 as target regime

Distribution channels

Developer platform and SDKs
PSP and acquirer integrations
ERP, payroll and marketplace plug-ins

Revenue logic

Per-transaction infrastructure fee
Reserve carry on network float
Platform and licensing fees to participants
Value-added APIs (escrow, programmable rules)

Cost logic

Platform engineering and 24/7 reliability
Consortium governance and legal set-up
Ecosystem incentives and integration support

Risk & controls

Chicken-and-egg adoption risk
Systemic dependency once volumes concentrate
Governance deadlock among consortium members

Key partners

Founding banks and PSPs
Ledger operator and security auditors
Software vendors and integrators

3. Participant data & value flow

Implementation sequence showing who sends what to whom.

Step 01Instruction / data
ParticipantPlatform / end-user app
Sends a payment, escrow, split-payment or streaming instruction through an SDK or API.
ParticipantPSP or acquirer
Step 02Instruction / data
ParticipantPSP or acquirer
Adds verified participant data and submits the instruction under shared network rules.
ParticipantConsortium issuer
Step 03CHF stablecoin
ParticipantConsortium issuer
Validates the transaction and mints or transfers the required CHF tokens.
ParticipantShared CHF ledger
Step 04CHF stablecoin
ParticipantShared CHF ledger
Executes programmable conditions and delivers final settlement to the recipient side.
ParticipantReceiving PSP / platform
Step 05Confirmation / control
ParticipantShared CHF ledger
Returns a common finality record and updates the real-time reserve dashboard.
ParticipantAll transaction participants
Step 06Fiat / reserves
ParticipantConsortium banks
Settle net funding and redemption positions in batches against CHF cash and short bonds.
ParticipantCentral reserve pool

End-to-end process, simplified

Platform / end-user appPSP or acquirerConsortium issuerShared CHF ledgerReceiving PSP / platform

The condensed chain of who hands what to whom; confirmation, reconciliation and reserve-management steps run alongside and are shown in the list above.

4. Spider chart — the evaluation

Scoring against the shared criteria grid

Highest ceiling and highest coordination cost: economics work only with network effects, and governance across consortium members is the critical path.

Interoperability5 / 5
Interoperability 5 — Built as shared infrastructure: native across ledgers, PSPs, banks and wallets, with SDKs and open APIs as the core product.
Operational complexity1 / 5
Operational complexity 1 — Multi-party governance, shared ledger operation, uniform compliance standards and joint incident management make this the heaviest model to run.
Risk3 / 5
Risk 3 — Full backing limits financial risk, but concentration and systemic importance raise the impact of any operational or governance failure.
Regulatory feasibility3 / 5
Regulatory feasibility 3 — Legally sound, yet consortium governance, competition questions and possible systemic-infrastructure treatment lengthen the approval path.
Economic viability4 / 5
Economic viability 4 — Network effects and per-transaction infrastructure fees give the highest long-run ceiling once critical mass is reached.

5. Deep dive — Agentic payments — AI agents as users of the shared CHF rail

Agentic payments are transactions initiated and executed by software agents — AI systems that hold a wallet or payment credential and pay for goods, data, API calls or services within a mandate set by a human or a company, without a person approving each payment. A shared, programmable CHF settlement layer is the natural rail for this: agents need machine-readable money that is available 24/7, settles with finality, supports conditional logic and can move very small amounts economically. The necessary rail would be a CHF stablecoin on the TWINT payments network: TWINT already provides Swiss-wide merchant acceptance, a large verified user base and established scheme governance, and a CHF token issued on that network gives agents a programmable, always-on settlement asset with instant reach into the Swiss retail and SME economy.

What agentic payments are

A human or company delegates a spending mandate to an AI agent: budget limits, approved counterparties, purpose restrictions and expiry.
The agent then pays autonomously — per API call, per dataset, per compute second, per delivery — instead of through invoices and monthly billing.
Emerging standards show the direction: HTTP-native micropayment schemes (x402-style), agentic commerce protocols from card networks and big tech (e.g. Visa Intelligent Commerce, Mastercard Agent Pay, Google AP2, OpenAI/Stripe agentic checkout).
Two modes coexist: agents paying on behalf of a consumer (delegated shopping) and agents paying other machines (pure machine-to-machine commerce).

Why the payment-infrastructure model fits best

Programmability is built in: escrow, streaming payments and conditional release are exactly the primitives agents need to pay per unit of work.
24/7 final settlement matches machine operating hours — agents do not wait for banking windows or batch cycles.
The open SDK and per-transaction fee model make micropayments viable, where card minimum fees would kill per-call billing.
Consortium governance gives agents and their operators a clear trust anchor: known validators, uniform compliance rules and a shared finality record.
CHF denomination lets Swiss machine economies (industrial IoT, mobility, energy, data marketplaces) settle in their home currency without FX friction.

Example agent flows on the shared CHF ledger

Pay-per-call: an analytics agent streams CHF fractions to a data provider's endpoint, releasing payment only when each response validates.
Procurement escrow: a purchasing agent locks CHF in a smart contract that releases to the supplier's agent when a logistics oracle confirms delivery.
Treasury sweeping: a corporate agent moves idle subsidiary balances into yield or back to group treasury, within board-approved limits (links to model 01).
Machine services: an EV-charging agent, a drone or a production robot pays for energy, routing or machine time autonomously.

New risks and the controls they require

Agent identity: counterparties must know which legal entity stands behind an agent — 'know your agent' (KYA) credentials bound to a verified operator.
Mandate enforcement: hard spending limits, allow-listed counterparties and purpose codes enforced at wallet or ledger level, not just in the agent's prompt.
Erroneous or manipulated autonomous payments: kill-switches, rate limits, human escalation thresholds and tamper-proof audit logs of every agent decision.
Liability: clear allocation between agent operator, infrastructure consortium and counterparty when an agent pays incorrectly — currently unsettled law in most jurisdictions.
AML/CFT: machine counterparties must be screened like human ones; high-frequency micropayments need automated monitoring rather than manual review.

Services offered

Agent wallets & spending mandates

Wallets issued to AI agents with hard budget limits, allow-listed counterparties, purpose codes and expiry — enforced at ledger level, not in the agent's prompt.

Know-your-agent (KYA) registry

Verified credentials binding every agent to the legal entity behind it, so merchants and other agents always know who they are dealing with.

Micropayment streaming

Per-call, per-second or per-unit billing in fractions of a rappen — the pricing model machine services need, uneconomic on card rails.

Escrow & conditional release

Smart-contract escrow that releases CHF to a supplier's agent only when a delivery oracle or validation check confirms the counter-performance.

Monitoring, kill-switch & audit

Real-time anomaly detection, rate limits, human escalation thresholds, an emergency stop per agent and a tamper-proof log of every payment decision.

Developer SDK & agent protocols

APIs and SDKs that let any software vendor plug agent payments into their product, including support for emerging agentic-commerce standards.

Settlement & reconciliation

24/7 final settlement in CHF on the shared ledger, with automated reconciliation feeds into ERP and accounting systems.

Compliance & reporting

Automated AML screening of machine counterparties, mandate-compliance reports and supervisory-ready records for the operating entities.

Business model canvas — Agentic payments — AI agents as users of the shared CHF rail

Value proposition

Machine-native CHF money: agents pay per call, per second or per unit of work
Escrow, streaming and conditional release as built-in primitives
24/7 final settlement in CHF — no banking windows, no batch cycles
Instant reach into Swiss retail and SMEs through the TWINT acceptance network

Holder / user segments

AI-agent operators and platforms acting for consumers and companies
Enterprises delegating procurement, treasury and payable agents
Machine economy: industrial IoT, EV charging, mobility, data marketplaces
Software vendors embedding agent payments into their products

Trust & reserve architecture

CHF stablecoin fully backed by CHF cash and short Confederation bonds
Issued on the TWINT payments network under its scheme governance
Mandate limits and KYA credentials enforced at wallet and ledger level

Regulatory anchor

Rides the issuer's existing licence and the TWINT scheme rules
KYA registry as the agent counterpart of KYC
Automated AMLA monitoring built for machine-frequency micropayments

Distribution channels

TWINT app and acceptance network as the consumer and merchant anchor
Agent SDKs, APIs and agentic-commerce protocol support
ERP, procurement and treasury-system integrations

Revenue logic

Per-transaction fee on every agent payment — viable at fractions of a rappen
Subscription fees for agent wallets, mandates and KYA credentials
Value-added services: escrow, streaming, monitoring and audit
Reserve carry on the network float

Cost logic

Ledger operation and 24/7 reliability at machine transaction volumes
KYA registry, monitoring and kill-switch operations
SDK and ecosystem development; scheme governance with TWINT

Risk & controls

Erroneous autonomous payments — hard mandate limits, kill-switches, escalation thresholds
Agent identity misuse — KYA credentials bound to verified legal entities
Unsettled liability for agent errors — contractual allocation frameworks
Machine-frequency AML — automated screening instead of manual review

Key partners

TWINT — scheme, acceptance network and user base
Issuing and consortium banks providing the backed CHF token
AI-platform and agent-framework providers
Oracle and data providers validating counter-performance

Scoring & spider chart — Agentic payments — AI agents as users of the shared CHF rail

Total 17 / 25

Interoperability4 / 5
Interoperability 4 — Agents pay merchants, platforms and other machines on one shared CHF rail; the TWINT network gives immediate domestic reach, while cross-border agent payments still depend on bridges to other ledgers.
Operational complexity2 / 5
Operational complexity 2 — Agent identity, mandate enforcement and 24/7 machine-frequency monitoring add a new operations layer on top of the shared ledger, though the underlying rail already exists.
Risk3 / 5
Risk 3 — Autonomous erroneous payments and unsettled liability are genuinely new risk classes; hard limits, kill-switches and KYA contain them but cannot remove them.
Regulatory feasibility3 / 5
Regulatory feasibility 3 — Builds on the issuer's licence and existing TWINT scheme rules, but KYA practice and machine-AML standards must still be established with supervisors.
Economic viability5 / 5
Economic viability 5 — The highest revenue ceiling of all models: every agent call is a fee event, so revenue scales with machine activity rather than human payment habits, and subscriptions plus value-added services stack on top.

Agentic payments turn the shared rail from a cost-saving utility into a high-frequency revenue engine: fees accrue per machine transaction, so the revenue model scales with the number of agents and calls — the strongest long-run economics of any use case on this page, provided agent identity, mandates and liability are solved.

MODEL 6.2Infrastructure

Recurring & usage-based payments

Authorised once, then paid on schedule or by measured usage — no manual transfer for every bill.

User / consumer assumptions

Customers want subscription and utility billing convenience and are willing to sign a standing mandate.
Every mandate carries explicit consent, spending caps and a working cancellation and revocation path.
Usage data (meter readings, API counters) is reliable and tamper-resistant enough to bill against.
Merchants and service providers accept CHF tokens or receive automatic conversion into bank money.

Who is already doing this

TWINT — recurring payments and standing authorisations in the Swiss consumer market.
Stripe Billing — subscription and metered, usage-based invoicing at scale.
Zuora / Chargebee — usage-based and subscription billing platforms for enterprises.

1. Morphological box — the design space

Issuer typeWho carries the claim	Licensed bank (BankG)	Fintech licence (Art. 1b BankG)	Trust / SPV with bank guarantee	Fund vehicle (FINMA-supervised)	Consortium / joint venture
Legal nature of claimWhat the holder actually owns	Deposit claim (on-balance-sheet)	E-money-style claim (off-balance-sheet)	Fund unit / share	Bearer note / debt instrument	Beneficial interest in a trust
Reserve compositionBacking quality	SNB sight deposits (100%)	CHF cash + short Confederation bonds	CHF money-market instruments	Diversified HQLA with duration ladder	Over-collateralised crypto / RWA
Yield treatmentWho keeps the carry	No yield to holder (issuer keeps carry)	Rebasing / accruing to holder	NAV-appreciating token	Tiered: retail 0, institutional pass-through	Rebates to merchants / distributors
Redemption & liquidityConvertibility to CHF	T+0 at par, 24/7	T+0 banking hours	T+1 / T+2 settlement	Gated with notice period	Secondary-market exit only
Ledger & interoperabilityWhere value is recorded	Public permissionless L1	Public L2 / rollup	Permissioned DLT (e.g. SDX)	Hybrid: permissioned mint, public circulation	Multi-chain with canonical bridge
Custody modelHow holders keep the token	Self-custody wallet	Regulated custodian	Bank-integrated wallet	MPC / smart-contract account	Omnibus with sub-ledger
Access & distributionWho may hold and where it is sold	Retail open access	Whitelisted retail (KYC at wallet level)	Professional investors only	Institutional / interbank only	Merchant / PSP acceptance network
Regulatory anchorSupervisory perimeter	Banking licence	Fintech licence (Art. 1b BankG)	Bank-guarantee exemption (FINMA GN 06/2024)	FinIA/FinIG authorisation (securities firm / manager)	Future dedicated stablecoin regime (consultation 22 Oct 2025)

Fintech issuance, e-money-style claim, smart-contract accounts enforcing spending mandates, whitelisted retail access with KYC at wallet level.

2. Stablecoin canvas — the business model

Value proposition

Set-and-forget billing: schedule-based or metered by real usage
Hard spending caps enforced at wallet level — no surprise debits
Micropayment-viable: per-unit billing below card minimum fees
Instant final settlement for the merchant, with invoice references on-chain

Holder / user segments

Consumers with subscriptions, utilities and mobility billing
SMEs paying for cloud, software and machine services
Service providers billing per use: energy, charging, data, API calls

Trust & reserve architecture

CHF cash plus short Confederation bonds
Smart-contract accounts enforcing mandate limits
Verified usage-data feeds as billing trigger

Regulatory anchor

Fintech licence (Art. 1b BankG) for the issuer
Explicit-consent and revocation duties for mandates
E-money and consumer-protection perimeter for retail wallets

Distribution channels

Wallet apps and banking front-ends
Merchant checkout and billing-system plug-ins
Metering and IoT integrations for usage-based billing

Revenue logic

Per-payment fee on every executed mandate payment
Billing-service subscriptions for merchants
Usage-metering integrations and reserve carry on wallet balances

Cost logic

Mandate management, revocation and dispute handling
Usage-data verification and fraud monitoring
Customer support at retail scale

Risk & controls

Unauthorised or erroneous debits — hard caps, allow-lists, revocation
Manipulated usage data — verified meters and signed data feeds
Insufficient funds — agreed fallback instead of silent failure

Key partners

Fintech issuer and wallet providers
Billing platforms and metering providers
Merchants, utilities and software vendors

3. Participant data & value flow

Implementation sequence showing who sends what to whom.

Step 01Instruction / data
ParticipantCustomer
Signs a mandate: spending cap, schedule or usage basis, approved payee and cancellation terms.
ParticipantPayment service
Step 02Confirmation / control
ParticipantBilling / usage verifier
Delivers the billing trigger — period end, verified meter reading or measured API usage.
ParticipantPayment service
Step 03CHF stablecoin
ParticipantPayment service
Pulls the authorised amount within the mandate limits; insufficient funds trigger the agreed fallback, not an overdraft.
ParticipantCustomer's wallet
Step 04CHF stablecoin
ParticipantPayment service
Settles the bill in CHF tokens with finality, tagged with the invoice reference for reconciliation.
ParticipantService provider's wallet
Step 05Fiat / reserves
ParticipantService provider
Redeems accumulated CHF tokens into bank money or reuses them for its own payments.
ParticipantIts bank account
Step 06Confirmation / control
ParticipantPayment service
Sends the statement, remaining mandate headroom and a one-tap revocation option.
ParticipantCustomer

End-to-end process, simplified

Customer mandateBilling / usage verifierPayment serviceService provider

The condensed chain of who hands what to whom; confirmation, reconciliation and reserve-management steps run alongside and are shown in the list above.

4. Spider chart — the evaluation

Scoring against the shared criteria grid

The most natural retail extension of the shared rail: recurring revenue by construction, with viability growing every time a new metered service comes online.

Interoperability4 / 5
Interoperability 4 — Mandates, wallets and billing systems connect through standard APIs, and the same rail serves subscriptions, utilities and machine metering; only cross-border recurrence needs bridges.
Operational complexity3 / 5
Operational complexity 3 — Mandate lifecycle, usage verification and retail support are real operations, but they follow established billing-platform patterns.
Risk3 / 5
Risk 3 — Fully backed tokens contain financial risk; the practical risks are unauthorised debits and manipulated usage data, controlled by caps, allow-lists and signed meter feeds.
Regulatory feasibility3 / 5
Regulatory feasibility 3 — The issuer fits the fintech route, but retail mandates carry explicit-consent, revocation and consumer-protection duties that must be built into the product.
Economic viability4 / 5
Economic viability 4 — Per-payment fees plus billing subscriptions scale with transaction count, and usage-based billing opens metered markets (energy, data, machine services) that cards cannot serve economically.

MODEL 6.3Infrastructure

Marketplace settlement & split payments

One customer payment, automatically allocated among seller, marketplace and partners — held until fulfilment, then split by rule.

User / consumer assumptions

The marketplace wants to offer sellers fast, transparent payout without becoming a bank itself.
Sellers trust that the allocation rules encoded in the settlement layer match their contracts.
Customers keep their refund and complaint rights even though the token transfer itself is irreversible.
Regulators accept the marketplace or PSP holding customer funds until fulfilment under a safeguarding or licence perimeter.

Who is already doing this

Stripe Connect — split payments and marketplace payouts with rule-based allocation to sellers and partners.
Adyen for Platforms — one acquiring flow, automated splitting and payout to sub-merchants.
Worldpay — marketplace acquiring with settlement and pay-out services for platform sellers.

1. Morphological box — the design space

Issuer typeWho carries the claim	Licensed bank (BankG)	Fintech licence (Art. 1b BankG)	Trust / SPV with bank guarantee	Fund vehicle (FINMA-supervised)	Consortium / joint venture
Legal nature of claimWhat the holder actually owns	Deposit claim (on-balance-sheet)	E-money-style claim (off-balance-sheet)	Fund unit / share	Bearer note / debt instrument	Beneficial interest in a trust
Reserve compositionBacking quality	SNB sight deposits (100%)	CHF cash + short Confederation bonds	CHF money-market instruments	Diversified HQLA with duration ladder	Over-collateralised crypto / RWA
Yield treatmentWho keeps the carry	No yield to holder (issuer keeps carry)	Rebasing / accruing to holder	NAV-appreciating token	Tiered: retail 0, institutional pass-through	Rebates to merchants / distributors
Redemption & liquidityConvertibility to CHF	T+0 at par, 24/7	T+0 banking hours	T+1 / T+2 settlement	Gated with notice period	Secondary-market exit only
Ledger & interoperabilityWhere value is recorded	Public permissionless L1	Public L2 / rollup	Permissioned DLT (e.g. SDX)	Hybrid: permissioned mint, public circulation	Multi-chain with canonical bridge
Custody modelHow holders keep the token	Self-custody wallet	Regulated custodian	Bank-integrated wallet	MPC / smart-contract account	Omnibus with sub-ledger
Access & distributionWho may hold and where it is sold	Retail open access	Whitelisted retail (KYC at wallet level)	Professional investors only	Institutional / interbank only	Merchant / PSP acceptance network
Regulatory anchorSupervisory perimeter	Banking licence	Fintech licence (Art. 1b BankG)	Bank-guarantee exemption (FINMA GN 06/2024)	FinIA/FinIG authorisation (securities firm / manager)	Future dedicated stablecoin regime (consultation 22 Oct 2025)

Consortium or fintech issuance, e-money-style claim, omnibus custody with per-seller sub-ledgers, distribution through the marketplace and PSP acceptance network.

2. Stablecoin canvas — the business model

Value proposition

One payment, many recipients: atomic split among seller, marketplace and partners
Funds held until fulfilment — buyer protection without a card chargeback
Auditable allocation rules; every payout reconciled on one ledger
Sellers paid in minutes, not in weekly payout batches

Holder / user segments

Online marketplaces and platform operators
Sellers, creators and delivery partners on those platforms
PSPs and acquirers serving platform business models

Trust & reserve architecture

CHF cash plus short Confederation bonds
Omnibus custody with per-seller sub-ledgers
Fulfilment-verification feed as release condition

Regulatory anchor

Fintech licence (Art. 1b BankG) or consortium bank issuance
Safeguarding rules for customer funds held pre-split
Consumer-protection duties stay with the marketplace

Distribution channels

Marketplace checkout and seller dashboards
PSP / acquirer integrations
Platform plug-ins (shop systems, ERP)

Revenue logic

Marketplace commission settled through the same transaction
Settlement and payout fees per split
Merchant-service subscriptions and reserve carry on the float

Cost logic

Allocation-rule engine and reconciliation tooling
Fulfilment verification and dispute operations
Onboarding and KYC of sellers and partners

Risk & controls

Refunds, returns and complaints — defined responsibility per party
Mis-allocated payouts — auditable rules and per-payout reconciliation
Irreversible transfers do not remove consumer obligations

Key partners

Marketplace operators and PSPs
Issuing bank or fintech issuer
Logistics and fulfilment-data providers

3. Participant data & value flow

Implementation sequence showing who sends what to whom.

Step 01Instruction / data
ParticipantCustomer
Pays once at checkout, possibly for goods from several sellers in a single basket.
ParticipantMarketplace / PSP
Step 02Instruction / data
ParticipantMarketplace / PSP
Submits the payment with the agreed allocation rules and fulfilment conditions for each entitled party.
ParticipantIssuer
Step 03CHF stablecoin
ParticipantIssuer
Mints or locks the CHF amount in a settlement contract that holds the funds until fulfilment is confirmed.
ParticipantSettlement contract
Step 04Confirmation / control
ParticipantFulfilment verifier
Confirms delivery or service completion; until then the funds stay locked and refundable.
ParticipantSettlement contract
Step 05CHF stablecoin
ParticipantSettlement contract
Releases the split: seller's share, marketplace commission and delivery-partner share in one atomic payout.
ParticipantSeller, marketplace & partners
Step 06Fiat / reserves
ParticipantSeller & partners
Redeem CHF tokens into bank money, or hold them for further on-chain payments.
ParticipantTheir bank accounts

End-to-end process, simplified

CustomerMarketplace / PSPIssuerSettlement contractSeller, marketplace & partners

The condensed chain of who hands what to whom; confirmation, reconciliation and reserve-management steps run alongside and are shown in the list above.

4. Spider chart — the evaluation

Scoring against the shared criteria grid

A natural extension of the shared rail: proven platform economics with moderate complexity — the winner is whoever already owns the marketplace relationship.

Interoperability3 / 5
Interoperability 3 — Plugs into marketplace checkouts, PSP APIs and shop systems, but every platform needs its own integration and allocation-rule mapping.
Operational complexity3 / 5
Operational complexity 3 — The split engine, fulfilment verification and per-seller reconciliation add real operations, yet they are standard platform patterns rather than bespoke bank builds.
Risk3 / 5
Risk 3 — Financial risk is contained by full backing and locked funds; the live risks are mis-allocation, disputes and consumer claims, which need process rather than capital.
Regulatory feasibility3 / 5
Regulatory feasibility 3 — Issuance fits the fintech or consortium route, but holding customer funds until fulfilment touches safeguarding and possibly PSP licensing, which must be structured carefully.
Economic viability4 / 5
Economic viability 4 — Commission, settlement fees and subscriptions are proven platform revenue lines; the token mainly cuts payout cost and settlement time.

MODEL 07Retail

B2C payments at the point of sale — with supplementary services

Everyday CHF spending at merchants, monetised through value-added services.

User / consumer assumptions

Consumers can pay at most Swiss merchants as easily as with TWINT or a debit card.
Transactions are final, but users retain familiar dispute and refund protections.
Merchants pay lower fees and receive settlement faster than on card rails.
Rewards, cashback or BNPL perks make switching from existing apps worthwhile.

Who is already doing this

Twint — Swiss mobile payment scheme used at POS; the incumbent any CHF token competes with, exploring digital-money extensions.
Worldpay / Worldline — acquirers piloting stablecoin settlement for merchants (e.g. USDC payouts via Circle).
Shopify merchants via Stripe — USDC accepted at online checkout, the closest live analogue for token payments at POS.

1. Morphological box — the design space

Issuer typeWho carries the claim	Licensed bank (BankG)	Fintech licence (Art. 1b BankG)	Trust / SPV with bank guarantee	Fund vehicle (FINMA-supervised)	Consortium / joint venture
Legal nature of claimWhat the holder actually owns	Deposit claim (on-balance-sheet)	E-money-style claim (off-balance-sheet)	Fund unit / share	Bearer note / debt instrument	Beneficial interest in a trust
Reserve compositionBacking quality	SNB sight deposits (100%)	CHF cash + short Confederation bonds	CHF money-market instruments	Diversified HQLA with duration ladder	Over-collateralised crypto / RWA
Yield treatmentWho keeps the carry	No yield to holder (issuer keeps carry)	Rebasing / accruing to holder	NAV-appreciating token	Tiered: retail 0, institutional pass-through	Rebates to merchants / distributors
Redemption & liquidityConvertibility to CHF	T+0 at par, 24/7	T+0 banking hours	T+1 / T+2 settlement	Gated with notice period	Secondary-market exit only
Ledger & interoperabilityWhere value is recorded	Public permissionless L1	Public L2 / rollup	Permissioned DLT (e.g. SDX)	Hybrid: permissioned mint, public circulation	Multi-chain with canonical bridge
Custody modelHow holders keep the token	Self-custody wallet	Regulated custodian	Bank-integrated wallet	MPC / smart-contract account	Omnibus with sub-ledger
Access & distributionWho may hold and where it is sold	Retail open access	Whitelisted retail (KYC at wallet level)	Professional investors only	Institutional / interbank only	Merchant / PSP acceptance network
Regulatory anchorSupervisory perimeter	Banking licence	Fintech licence (Art. 1b BankG)	Bank-guarantee exemption (FINMA GN 06/2024)	FinIA/FinIG authorisation (securities firm / manager)	Future dedicated stablecoin regime (consultation 22 Oct 2025)

Fintech-licensed e-money-style claim on a public L2, smart-contract wallets, merchant/PSP acceptance network, rebates funded by reserve carry.

2. Stablecoin canvas — the business model

Value proposition

Instant, final CHF payment at POS with no chargeback risk for merchants
Merchant fees well below card interchange
Consumer perks: loyalty, instant refunds, receipts on-chain
Supplementary services: BNPL, budgeting, cashback, vouchers

Holder / user segments

Swiss consumers with mobile wallets
SME retailers, hospitality and e-commerce
Loyalty-programme operators

Trust & reserve architecture

CHF cash and short bonds with a custodian bank
Segregated client money, daily reconciliation
Public attestations to sustain consumer trust

Regulatory anchor

Fintech licence (Art. 1b BankG) with deposit cap
AMLA onboarding, consumer-credit rules if BNPL is offered
Card-scheme-free but PSP contracts still apply

Distribution channels

Merchant POS terminals and QR acceptance (TWINT-style)
E-commerce checkout plug-ins
Consumer wallet app and neobank partners

Revenue logic

Merchant discount rate (low but volume-driven)
Supplementary services: loyalty SaaS, BNPL interest, data insights
Reserve carry on wallet balances
Voucher and campaign revenue share

Cost logic

Terminal / acceptance rollout and merchant onboarding
Consumer acquisition incentives and cashback
Support, dispute handling and fraud operations

Risk & controls

Two-sided adoption risk against entrenched TWINT and cards
Fraud and irreversible-payment consumer harm
Margin compression: carry funds the perks

Key partners

POS terminal vendors and acquirers
Retail chains as anchor merchants
Loyalty and BNPL providers, custodian bank

3. Participant data & value flow

Implementation sequence showing who sends what to whom.

Step 01Instruction / data
ParticipantConsumer wallet
Sends the merchant ID, amount and authorised payment after a scan, tap or online checkout.
ParticipantMerchant POS / checkout
Step 02Instruction / data
ParticipantMerchant POS / checkout
Routes the payment through the acquirer or PSP for balance, limit and fraud checks.
ParticipantFintech issuer
Step 03CHF stablecoin
ParticipantFintech issuer
Transfers CHF tokens from the consumer wallet with immediate ledger finality.
ParticipantMerchant wallet
Step 04Confirmation / control
ParticipantAcquirer / PSP
Confirms payment and supplies the digital receipt to both parties.
ParticipantConsumer and merchant
Step 05Confirmation / control
ParticipantLoyalty or BNPL provider
Applies cashback, loyalty, refund or financing rules to the confirmed transaction.
ParticipantConsumer and merchant
Step 06Fiat / reserves
ParticipantIssuer / custodian bank
Burns accumulated merchant tokens at redemption and pays out CHF from segregated reserves.
ParticipantMerchant bank account

End-to-end process, simplified

Consumer walletMerchant POS / checkoutFintech issuerMerchant walletMerchant bank account

The condensed chain of who hands what to whom; confirmation, reconciliation and reserve-management steps run alongside and are shown in the list above.

4. Spider chart — the evaluation

Scoring against the shared criteria grid

Attractive merchant economics but the toughest go-to-market in Switzerland: supplementary services, not payment fees, must carry the P&L.

Interoperability4 / 5
Interoperability 4 — Works through existing POS terminals, acquirers and wallets, so merchants adopt it without replacing hardware.
Operational complexity1 / 5
Operational complexity 1 — Terminal certification, merchant onboarding, refunds and chargeback handling, loyalty and BNPL services create a very wide operating surface.
Risk3 / 5
Risk 3 — Fully backed, but consumer fraud, refund abuse and merchant credit exposure through supplementary services add real risk.
Regulatory feasibility3 / 5
Regulatory feasibility 3 — Payment-token issuance is feasible; the supplementary services (credit, loyalty, BNPL) each pull in additional regulatory duties.
Economic viability2 / 5
Economic viability 2 — Swiss card fees are already low and Twint is entrenched, so payment fees alone cannot fund the model.

Side-by-side comparison

CHF business model	Interoperability	Operational complexity	Risk	Regulatory feasibility	Economic viability	Total
01 · Treasury Management — Intercompany Transfer	4	3	4	4	4	19 / 25
02 · Cross-border payments — B2B	4	2	4	4	4	18 / 25
03 · Cross-border payments — B2C	4	2	3	3	3	15 / 25
04 · Digital-asset trading — B2B	3	3	4	4	4	18 / 25
05 · Digital-asset trading — B2C	4	3	3	4	2	16 / 25
6.1 · CHF stablecoin as payment infrastructure	5	1	3	3	4	16 / 25
07 · B2C payments at the point of sale — with supplementary services	4	1	3	3	2	13 / 25

Best value for the banking industry

Ranked by total score across the five shared criteria (maximum 25). The models with the strongest value for banks share three traits: issuance under an existing banking licence, institutional-only counterparties, and revenue lines that a bank can already price — FX, settlement and treasury services.

#1 · 01 · 19 / 25

Treasury Management — Intercompany Transfer

The highest-scoring model overall. A bank already owns the client relationship, issues under its banking licence, and monetises treasury services it sells today. Whitelisted group entities keep AML and conduct risk contained, and enterprise integration fees plus reserve carry give durable revenue.

#2 · 02 · 18 / 25

Cross-border payments — B2B

Directly replaces correspondent-banking layers and nostro pre-funding — a cost line every Swiss bank knows. High ticket sizes, FX spread and settlement fees map onto existing product P&Ls, and bank or consortium issuance has a clear supervisory home. The main burden is operational: corridor liquidity and 24/7 FX hedging.

#3 · 04 · 18 / 25

Digital-asset trading — B2B

Institutional counterparties, atomic DvP settlement against tokenised securities and a FinIA/DLT-Act perimeter mean low conduct risk for the bank. Reserve carry on large trading balances and settlement fees are healthy; growth is capped only by tokenised-securities volumes.

Why the retail-facing models rank lower

The consumer models — cross-border B2C (15 / 25), digital-asset trading B2C (16 / 25) and POS payments (13 / 25) — compete against entrenched, low-fee Swiss rails (TWINT, cards, SEPA), carry heavy per-user onboarding and support costs, and pull the bank into retail conduct duties far from its core business. The payment infrastructure model (16 / 25) has the highest long-run ceiling but requires multi-bank consortium governance and shared operations, which few banks can commit to on their own.

Ranking within each category

Each category ranked by total score across the five shared criteria (maximum 25).

Wholesale

#101 · Treasury Management — Intercompany Transfer19 / 25 #202 · Cross-border payments — B2B18 / 25 #304 · Digital-asset trading — B2B18 / 25

The treasury model leads: the bank issues under its own licence, keeps the client relationship and sells treasury services it already prices today.

Retail

#105 · Digital-asset trading — B2C16 / 25 #203 · Cross-border payments — B2C15 / 25 #307 · B2C payments at the point of sale — with supplementary services13 / 25

Digital-asset trading B2C edges ahead on institutional-grade volumes, while POS payments trail on per-user onboarding cost and fee pressure.

Infrastructure

#16.2 · Recurring & usage-based payments17 / 25 #26.1 · CHF stablecoin as payment infrastructure16 / 25 #36.3 · Marketplace settlement & split payments16 / 25

Recurring & usage-based payments lead the category: recurring revenue by construction, lighter governance than the shared rail, and metered markets that cards cannot serve. The shared CHF rail itself carries the highest long-run ceiling — at the price of multi-bank consortium governance.

Criteria definitions & assessment scale

Each criterion is scored 1–5. The scale below explains what each level means.

Interoperability

Ability to plug into existing payment rails, ledgers, wallets and banking APIs; compatibility with public L2s, permissioned DLT and cross-chain bridges.

1 — Siloed: single closed ledger, no public API, no bridge, no wallet choice.
2 — Limited: one partner API or one public chain with thin integration.
3 — Connected: multi-channel via regulated custodians, banking APIs and major wallets.
4 — Open: public L2 + banking rails + whitelisted venues and SDKs.
5 — Ubiquitous: native across L1/L2, TradFi PSPs, wallets, DeFi and cross-chain bridges.

Operational complexity

Effort to build and run the stack: core-banking integration, custody, attestations, monitoring, treasury and redemption operations. Scored inversely — higher is simpler.

1 — Very heavy: bespoke build, manual operations, dedicated 24/7 team.
2 — Heavy: deep core-banking and custody integration, many in-house processes.
3 — Moderate: standard APIs, regulated custodian, periodic attestation, run-book in place.
4 — Light: outsourced custody, automated mint/burn, few integration partners.
5 — Minimal: white-label infrastructure, near-fully automated, small operating footprint.

Risk

Composite of reserve, credit, liquidity, operational, fraud and run risk — including reliability of par redemption under stress. Scored inversely — higher is safer.

1 — High: material credit, liquidity, run, fraud or smart-contract risk with limited transparency.
2 — Elevated: concentrated reserves, novel technology or weak redemption assurance.
3 — Moderate: diversified HQLA, audited reserves and established settlement rails.
4 — Low: segregated high-quality assets, regulated custodian and frequent attestation.
5 — Minimal: central-bank or equivalent reserves, bankruptcy remoteness, instant par redemption.

Regulatory feasibility

How readily the model fits an existing Swiss licence or exemption under BankG, FinIA/FinIG and FINMA practice, and how well it maps onto the Federal Council consultation draft of 22 October 2025.

1 — Prohibited or no discernible licence path under current or draft Swiss law.
2 — Unclear: only viable if a new regime is enacted, with high implementation risk.
3 — Conditional: permitted under existing framework but requires material adaptation.
4 — Clear: fits an available exemption or fintech / banking licence route with known steps.
5 — Straightforward: fully covered by existing licence or explicit regulatory blessing.

Economic viability

Ability to cover fixed cost from reserve carry, spreads and fees at realistic CHF rate levels — including a zero or negative rate scenario.

1 — Not viable: costs exceed realistic revenue even at scale.
2 — Marginal: break-even only at very large scale or with ongoing subsidy.
3 — Moderate: covers costs at scale under current rate assumptions.
4 — Healthy: multiple revenue lines produce a comfortable margin.
5 — Resilient: strong unit economics even in a zero or negative CHF rate environment.

+ Additional opportunities

Other business models

Additional product concepts built on CHF-token payment and settlement rails. These are extensions of the seven core models, not additional scored models in the comparison above — marketplace settlement and recurring payments have been promoted into the infrastructure category with full scoring. The examples are illustrative scenarios, not claims of live deployments.

Escrow — payment released upon receipt of goods

A buyer places CHF stablecoins in escrow. The seller receives payment only when the agreed evidence confirms that the buyer has received the goods. If delivery fails or a dispute arises, the money stays locked until the agreed refund or dispute process is completed.

Example

A Swiss importer orders equipment. The purchase amount is locked before shipment; delivery confirmation and buyer acceptance trigger release to the supplier.

Buyer
Escrow provider / contract
Delivery verifier & buyer
Seller

Revenue model: Escrow fees, delivery-verification fees and optional dispute-resolution services.
Key conditions & risks: Define what counts as receipt, who can confirm it, an acceptance deadline, and refund and dispute rules. A blockchain cannot independently verify physical delivery: a trusted verifier or authenticated delivery feed is needed. Receipt does not necessarily prove quality or contractual acceptance.
Connection to the seven models: Adds conditional release to cross-border B2B or B2C payments.

FX transfer — CHF to USDC

A customer converts Swiss francs into USDC, a US-dollar stablecoin, and sends it to a recipient. CHF bank money first needs an on-ramp; a CHF stablecoin can instead be exchanged through a supported trading venue or liquidity provider.

Example

A Swiss company funds a supplier payment in CHF. A provider quotes the CHF/USD rate and fees, delivers USDC to the supplier’s supported wallet, and the supplier holds it or converts it into local bank money.

CHF payer
On-ramp / CHF-token issuer
FX & liquidity provider
Recipient’s USDC wallet

Revenue model: FX spread, conversion and transfer fees, and enterprise integration services.
Key conditions & risks: Show the actual exchange rate, spread, fees and quote expiry; never assume CHF and USDC exchange 1:1. Check liquidity, slippage, wallet addresses and supported networks. Atomic payment-versus-payment is possible only with compatible infrastructure; otherwise settlement and counterparty risk remain. USDC adds issuer, depeg, freezing and USD exchange-rate exposure.
Connection to the seven models: Extends cross-border payments and trading with a CHF-to-USD conversion leg.

Milestone-based project payments

A client funds agreed project stages in CHF tokens. Each instalment is released after the corresponding deliverable has been approved, rather than paying everything upfront or waiting until the whole project is finished.

Example

A construction client releases separate payments after design approval, delivery of materials and final inspection.

Client
Funded payment contract
Milestone approver
Contractor

Revenue model: Project-payment administration fees and integration with procurement systems.
Key conditions & risks: Use clear milestone definitions, signed approval evidence, change-order procedures and independent dispute handling. Avoid unilateral release authority and provide a recovery path if an approver or service provider becomes unavailable.
Connection to the seven models: Combines B2B payments with programmable escrow.

Invoice financing & supplier early payment

A financier pays a supplier early in CHF stablecoins against an approved invoice. The buyer settles the invoice at maturity. The token accelerates the payment leg; it does not eliminate lending or debtor risk.

Example

An SME receives payment for a verified invoice before its due date, less an agreed financing charge, while its corporate customer pays later.

Supplier & verified invoice
Financier
Supplier’s CHF wallet
Buyer repayment

Revenue model: Financing charges and invoice-verification or servicing fees.
Key conditions & risks: Verify invoice authenticity, debtor creditworthiness and assignment rights, and prevent duplicate financing. Keep credit underwriting, collections and legal enforceability separate from token settlement.
Connection to the seven models: Adds a credit product to treasury and cross-border B2B payments.

CHF stablecoinbusiness models

Morphological box — the WHAT

Stablecoin canvas — the HOW

Spider chart — the WHETHER

The seven models — grouped into three categories

+ Wholesale

+ Retail

+ Infrastructure

User / consumer assumptions

Who is already doing this

1. Morphological box — the design space

2. Stablecoin canvas — the business model

Value proposition

Holder / user segments

Trust & reserve architecture

Regulatory anchor

Distribution channels

Revenue logic

Cost logic

Risk & controls

Key partners

3. Participant data & value flow

End-to-end process, simplified

4. Spider chart — the evaluation

User / consumer assumptions

Who is already doing this

1. Morphological box — the design space

2. Stablecoin canvas — the business model

Value proposition

Holder / user segments

Trust & reserve architecture

Regulatory anchor

Distribution channels

Revenue logic

Cost logic

Risk & controls

Key partners

3. Participant data & value flow

End-to-end process, simplified

4. Spider chart — the evaluation

User / consumer assumptions

Who is already doing this

1. Morphological box — the design space

2. Stablecoin canvas — the business model

Value proposition

Holder / user segments

Trust & reserve architecture

Regulatory anchor

Distribution channels

Revenue logic

Cost logic

Risk & controls

Key partners

3. Participant data & value flow

End-to-end process, simplified

4. Spider chart — the evaluation

User / consumer assumptions

Who is already doing this

1. Morphological box — the design space

2. Stablecoin canvas — the business model

Value proposition

Holder / user segments

Trust & reserve architecture

Regulatory anchor

Distribution channels

Revenue logic

Cost logic

Risk & controls

Key partners

3. Participant data & value flow

End-to-end process, simplified

4. Spider chart — the evaluation

User / consumer assumptions

Who is already doing this

1. Morphological box — the design space

2. Stablecoin canvas — the business model

Value proposition

Holder / user segments

Trust & reserve architecture

Regulatory anchor

CHF stablecoin
business models