A consortium of Swiss banks and fintechs — UBS, PostFinance, Sygnum, Raiffeisen, Zürcher Kantonalbank (ZKB), Banque Cantonale Vaudoise (BCV) and Swiss Stablecoin AG — announced a joint sandbox to trial use cases for a Swiss franc stablecoin.
The group said the initiative will let participating banks experiment with selected CHF stablecoin applications in a controlled “digital live” environment. The exercise is intended to build practical experience in issuing and handling digital payment instruments and to explore how blockchain-based payments can connect to the Swiss franc.
The sandbox is scheduled to run in 2026. Swiss Stablecoin AG will provide the issuance infrastructure, and the project is open to other banks, companies and institutions that want to join.
The move follows earlier Swiss experiments with tokenized money. In September 2025 UBS, PostFinance and Sygnum completed a deposit-token proof of concept under the Swiss Bankers Association that tested legally binding interbank payments on a public blockchain. That PoC examined customer-to-customer payments and an escrow-like exchange involving tokenized real-world assets. The SBA reported the trial confirmed feasibility for institutional blockchain payments but said scaling would require further design work and broader collaboration with banks, regulators and infrastructure providers.
Previous stablecoin activity in Switzerland includes Bitcoin Suisse AG’s CryptoFranc (XCHF), which the firm described as a payment token before announcing it would discontinue issuance and redemption on Aug. 16, 2024.
By balance-sheet size, UBS is Switzerland’s largest bank with roughly $1.7 trillion in assets, followed by Raiffeisen Schweiz ($353 billion), Zürcher Kantonalbank ($241 billion) and PostFinance ($121 billion), according to Advratings data.
The new sandbox is the latest coordinated effort by major Swiss lenders to test how tokenized currencies and blockchain rails might be used for payments, custody and interbank settlement while remaining compliant with Swiss financial rules. Readers are encouraged to verify details independently.