Switzerland: Litigation, Mediation & Arbitration

It is probably fitting that we begin our series of articles for Mondaq's White-Collar Crime Newsfeed with the discussion of a ruling that concerns the privilege of communications with foreign lawyers in criminal proceedings.

Artificial intelligence has made it easier than ever to create convincing fake videos, audio recordings, and images—raising urgent questions about how international arbitration tribunals should handle disputed audiovisual evidence. As deepfakes become more sophisticated and harder to detect, arbitrators face a growing challenge: determining not just what weight to give evidence, but whether that evidence is authentic at all.

In QPQ Limited v Schute [2025] IEHC 474, the High Court (Court) considered the defendant's application to admit into evidence certain correspondence exchanged between the parties' solicitors.

The debate over replacing investor-State arbitration with a permanent standing investment court has moved from theory to practice, with UNCITRAL Working Group III now considering detailed draft statutes. While proponents argue that a permanent bench would reduce repeat-player incentives and improve consistency, critics warn that concentrating appointment power in States' hands, eliminating party participation in tribunal selection, and creating hierarchical appellate structures may introduce new problems of

Switzerland has spent the past decade building one of the world's most advanced legal environments for financial technology. The very features that attract fintech and blockchain ventures – early regulatory clarity, the DLT framework, a dense financial infrastructure and a strongly international client base – are now generating a steady stream of disputes of considerable legal and technical complexity. Such disputes arise from payment services, digital banking, lending platforms, crypto-assets and custody arrangements, outsourcing relationships, cybersecurity incidents and regulatory enforcement.

Construction delay disputes become particularly complex when employer-risk and contractor-risk events overlap, creating what is known as concurrent delay.

Préjudice irréparable par le refus de jonction de plusieurs procédures pénales et violation du droit d'être entendu du prévenu [p. 2]

The Swiss Federal Supreme Court has clarified critical procedural rules governing international litigation priority when initial court filings fail on technical grounds. This landmark decision addresses whether claimants can preserve their original filing date when transitioning from a dismissed clear-cases application to ordinary proceedings, and how this interacts with parallel proceedings in foreign courts under the Lugano Convention.

International arbitration delivers final, binding awards, but losing parties often attempt to re-litigate objections across multiple jurisdictions. This analysis examines how transnational issue estoppel prevents award debtors from repeatedly challenging the same issues before different courts, exploring recent decisions from Singapore, England, India, and France that shape the doctrine's application in cross-border enforcement proceedings.

In a landmark decision dated 5 June 2026 (4A_481/2025, intended for publication in the official bulletin), the Swiss Federal Supreme Court confirms that Art. 63 CPC, which sets the continuation of lis pendens, also applies within the context of the Convention on Jurisdiction and Enforcement of Judgments in Civil and Commercial Matters of 30 October 2007 (the "Lugano Convention").

This article examines the administrative confiscation mechanism under Article 35 FINMAG, analyzing its legal nature, material requirements, and practical application after 16 years of Swiss financial market supervision. The authors explore critical questions surrounding profit calculation, the scope of deductible expenses, and whether the current enforcement toolkit adequately deters supervisory law violations.

In August 2025, Washington imposed a 39% tariff on Swiss exports, later reduced to 15% through a framework arrangement. Following a U.S. Supreme Court ruling...