 | Our Institute
The Swiss Finance Institute is a private foundation created in 2006 by Switzerland's banking and finance community in cooperation with leading Swiss universities. It supports and advances research, doctoral training and executive education in banking and finance. The Institute is supported by the Swiss banks, the Swiss Stock Exchange, Swiss universities and the Swiss Federal Government.
Our Roots
Our Initiative
As a world-leading financial centre, Switzerland has the natural ambition to house a world-leading research and training center in banking and finance. In pursuit of this ambition the Swiss Bankers Association (SBA) has invested in the creation of the Swiss Finance Institute, a foundation with the sole purpose of achieving excellence in banking and finance education and research with the hope of making Swiss universities the destination of choice for financial market specialists from all over the world.
The initiative was well received by the Swiss universities. The federal government also maintains close links to the Swiss Finance Institute. It supports the planned operational cooperation between the Swiss Finance Institute, NCCR FINRISK and the Swiss National Science Foundation and strongly encourages a close coordination among the universities, considering the initiative a shining example of public-private cooperation in academia.
Our Goals
Over the medium term, the Swiss Finance Institute aims to become a leading research and teaching organization in the area of banking and finance, achieving top-3 status in Europe and top-10 in the world. To achieve this objective as many as 30 professorships will be created in the next 5 years in the partner universities with a total of 50 faculties being supported with appropriate incentives and research funding. Fundamental and applied research projects will be launched in some key areas of finance and banking. A Swiss PhD program in finance will also be promoted. Support of new initiatives in executive education is forthcoming.
Our Activities
The Swiss Finance Institute is active in both research and executive education. Excellence at both levels will increase Switzerland’s attractiveness for outstanding researchers, teachers, students and participants in executive education program and sustain the ambition of becoming a world leader in banking and finance education.
Promoting Research
Our commitment to research will be manifest in three specific areas: structural promotion, a PhD- program and support of research projects.
- Structural promotion. Through an incentive-driven scheme, the Swiss Finance Institute aims to attract leading professors and researchers in the field of banking and finance to teaching posts, by co-financing university professorships. The structural promotion will foster more solid partnerships extending across national borders and ensure that the structures are in place to sustain excellence in research and executive education.
- PhD Program. Focusing on the importance of cultivating high-potential researchers, the Swiss Finance Institute supports and promotes a nationally-coordinated PhD program for outstanding doctoral candidates. In line with an internationally recognized PhD model, the Swiss Finance Institute offers a selected group of students holding a master degree in financial economics the best possible start to their professional career, namely a defined three to four-year programme with courses / seminars and intensive tutoring. Our PhD program aspires to become the leading doctoral program in finance in Europe.
- Research Projects. The Swiss Finance Institute supports and promotes promising research projects in selected subject areas. Our commitment to supporting research projects is to ensure that the best researchers find the most satisfactory research conditions available. Faculty and Doctoral research grants directly complement facilities offered by universities and other research sponsors. Awarded annually, the Swiss Finance Institute Prize (formerly FAME Research Prize) provides visibility to the best recent research published in the field of asset management and financial engineering.
The previously mentioned activities are all designed to nourish a productive research activity within the universities and to disseminate its output in practitioners’ circles.
Promoting Executive Education
Aware of the necessity of upholding a high level of executive education, the Swiss Finance Institute has brought the existing range of executive education programs, which have been run successfully by FAME and the Swiss Banking School, under one roof and is now in a position to offer a broad palette of international and national executive programs. In addition, an internationally accredited Master’s Degree in Asset and Wealth Management will be offered as of May 2011 jointly with HEC Lausanne, Faculty of Business and Economics at the University of Lausanne and Tepper School of Business at Carnegie Mellon University.
Knowledge transfer from research to academia and ultimately to practice will be enhanced, allowing research findings to flow more readily into courses, while, conversely, allowing practical and academic requirements to feed back into research topics.
The Swiss Finance Institute has also set up an Executive Education Advisory Board comprising leading specialists and experienced practitioners from the fields of education and vocational training to oversee the strategic orientation of the courses offered and to ensure that high standards of quality and an excellent reputation are upheld.
Our Financing
The Swiss Finance Institute requires annual funding of CHF 18 million for its activities. All involved parties contribute financially to the foundation’s promotional efforts: Every year, the federal government / Swiss National Science Foundation will put in CHF 3 to 4 million through the continuation to FINRISK; the private foundations will donate revenue from their assets amounting to CHF 2 Million and the universities will add CHF 6 million through co-financing of research projects and structural measures. The banks will fill any funding gaps. They have set up a joint fund containing CHF 75 million in total that will pay out up to 7 million a year over the next 15 years. Each SBA member bank will contribute its fair share. Some, including the founder banks of the Swiss Finance Institute, will make substantial additional contributions. All these measures play a major role in ensuring the initiatives’ long-term sustainability.
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