In an age of digital transformation, SIX offers secure and convenient payment solutions for a sustainable Swiss financial center.
SIX offers smart, flexible solutions for banks issuing debit cards. Our issuing processing is precisely tailored to cardholders’ needs.
With its Bancomat system, SIX operates the largest ATM network in Switzerland and is your partner for cash solutions related to ATMs.
SIX offers payments processing services between financial institutions.
The Swiss financial center is introducing beneficial standards, and also taking the opportunity to harmonize payments.
SIC Is Fully Aligned with the Swiss National Bank
Since 1987, SIX has been processing payments in a highly efficient manner via the Swiss Interbank Clearing (SIC) system – in real-time and around the clock. Monitored and steered by the Swiss National Bank (SNB), SIC is the most important payment system in Switzerland, facilitating transactions between banks worldwide. Efficient, secure and quick for both large-value and retail payments, financial institutions process the majority of their interbank liabilities in Swiss francs via SIC on a global scale.
Take advantage of the many benefits of the SIC payment system. Learn more about how financial institutions can connect to SIC.
SIC processes payments and offers liquidity management in real-time
The SIC payment system only executes transactions if the settlement account is covered with sufficient funds
The interbank security system ensures that messages are transmitted reliably and confidentially
SIC continually processes payments in real-time, allowing participants to submit and receive transactions 24 hours a day. The system verifies the incoming payment orders using electronic signatures and master data checks to monitor whether the system participant is authenticated and authorized to enter data. Where sufficient funds are available, SIC settles the payment irrevocably and finally and debits or credits the participant's settlement account with the corresponding amount. System participants can constantly monitor incoming and outgoing payments in real-time and, by doing so, at any time obtain information about the current status of their settlement account.
Banks connect to the SIC and euroSIC payment systems via Messaging Gateway, SWIFT or the web portal. SASS and Finance IPNet ensure the highest possible level of security for both hardware and software.
SIX has been operating the SIC payment system since 1987. As such, it is one of the world’s leading real-time gross settlement (RTGS) systems. SIC offers system participants around-the-clock interbank payment services with real-time transaction settlement and liquidity management. Various pricing options are available.
The SIC system plays a key role in implementing the Swiss National Bank’s monetary policy. As a result, SIC is crucial to the Swiss financial center and full electronic integration of trading, clearing and settlement of shares, bonds, derivatives, structured products and repo transactions in Switzerland (Swiss Value Chain).
For each transaction, SIC verifies the relevant account to determine if the funds are sufficient to settle the payment. This way, transactions are only executed if the necessary funds are available. Otherwise the payment is routed to a wait file and kept pending until sufficient funds have become available through incoming payments or a liquidity supply.
An interbank security system enables to execute millions of transactions worth billions of Swiss francs absolutely confidentially and securely. It ensures especially the following:
Number of transactions in the last 12 months (in million)
Turnover in the last 12 months (in billion CHF)
Number of transactions since 2000
Turnover since 2000