Reference
The AMLA, in plain language.
The vocabulary of Swiss anti-money-laundering duties — defined the way you’d explain them to a colleague, not the way the statute does. Orientation only; not legal advice.
- AMLA / GwG Geldwäschereigesetz
- The Swiss Anti-Money Laundering Act — the federal statute that obliges financial intermediaries to identify clients, establish beneficial ownership, screen and monitor relationships, keep records, and report suspicions.
- Financial intermediary Finanzintermediär · Art. 2
- Anyone who, on a professional basis, accepts, holds, helps invest or transfer assets belonging to others — banks, but also trustees, asset managers, and lawyers when they perform such functions. Being one triggers the full set of AMLA duties.
- Advisor Berater:in · Art. 8b
- A distinct, lighter AMLA category introduced with the revised law: professionals who prepare or execute certain transactions (e.g. company formation, real-estate structuring) without holding assets. Fewer duties than an intermediary — but real ones, and documented ones.
- KYC Know Your Customer
- The umbrella term for the due-diligence duties: identify the contracting party, establish the beneficial owner, understand the business background, classify the risk, and keep all of it current.
- Form A Formular A
- The standard declaration of the beneficial owner of assets — who ultimately owns what is being brought into the relationship. Required whenever the contracting party is not the beneficial owner (and in most cases regardless).
- Form K Formular K
- The declaration of the controlling person of an operating legal entity — who ultimately controls the company, by voting rights, capital, or other means. The corporate counterpart to Form A.
- Form S Formular S
- The declaration used for foundations and similar structures — identifying founders, beneficiaries and the persons with power to act.
- Form T Formular T
- The declaration used for trusts — identifying settlor, trustees, protectors and beneficiaries of the arrangement.
- Beneficial owner Wirtschaftlich berechtigte Person
- The natural person who ultimately owns or controls the assets or entity — the person the whole regime is designed to make visible. Switzerland is introducing a federal register of beneficial owners, raising the bar for keeping this information accurate.
- PEP Politisch exponierte Person
- A politically exposed person — senior political, governmental, judicial or military figures, their close associates and family. A PEP relationship is not forbidden; it mandatorily raises the risk level and requires senior approval and enhanced clarification.
- Sanctions screening Sanktionsprüfung · SECO / UN
- Checking parties against sanctions and embargo lists — in Switzerland primarily the SECO consolidated list and the UN Security Council lists. A hit is a hard stop until cleared; screening must be repeated, not done once.
- Special clarifications Besondere Abklärungen · Art. 6
- The additional inquiries required when a relationship or transaction is unusual or carries heightened risk: source of funds, background of the transaction, plausibility of the stated purpose — documented so a third party can follow the reasoning.
- Risk classification Risikoklassifizierung
- The duty to categorise every business relationship by risk (and flag those with increased risk), using criteria such as domicile, industry, structure complexity and PEP status — then to match the depth of due diligence and monitoring to that category.
- Ongoing monitoring Laufende Überwachung
- AMLA duties do not end at onboarding: relationships and transactions must be monitored continuously, screenings repeated, and files kept current for as long as the relationship lasts.
- MROS Meldestelle für Geldwäscherei
- The Money Laundering Reporting Office Switzerland at fedpol. When there is founded suspicion that assets stem from crime, the intermediary must file a report (Meldung) with MROS — with strict rules on timing, confidentiality and what may be told to the client.
- SRO Selbstregulierungsorganisation
- A self-regulatory organisation licensed by FINMA to supervise non-bank financial intermediaries. SRO membership brings a rulebook, annual reporting — and audits in which your files must reconstruct cleanly.
- 10-year retention Aufbewahrungspflicht · Art. 7
- Records and receipts must be kept for ten years after the end of the business relationship or transaction — in a form that lets the duties be reconstructed. A drawer of paper technically qualifies; an audit rarely enjoys it.
- Conflict of interest check Konfliktprüfung
- Not an AMLA duty but a professional one, and the correct first gate of any intake: before a mandate is examined at all, the firm must know it can act. Running it first keeps every later step clean.
Portus turns these duties into one workflow.
Triage, KYC, screening, sealed file — see it on scenarios like yours.