Alternatives for Cash, ETFs & Passive Funds

Banks, Insurances & Third Pillar
1

Hello,

I keep some of my savings and investments (cash account, ETFs, passive funds) with Key4 UBS. I’d like to move the money to cheaper options if possible.

UBS’s fees are on the higher side, but I found it convenient to keep all my accounts in one place.
I’ve been reading this forum and have been considering alternative options for a while.

Currently I have a bank account at Key4 UBS with:

  • Cash: ≈ 50K
  • Investment products (ETF and passive funds - CH and global): ≈ 50k
  • Pillar 3a (100% equities): ≈ 50k

(I have a VIAC 3a and a Global 100 invest, I will not touch them)

What I am considering:

  • Cash: ≈ 50K → to transfer some amount to Yuh bank and to pay with their Twint and Master card
  • Investment products (ETF and passive funds - CH and global): ≈ 50k → considering Swissquote or Interractive Brokers
  • Pillar 3a (100% equities): ≈ 50k → to transfer to a new Finpension 3a Global 100% equities.

What do you think of this setup, and what would you recommend?

Thank you for your help.

2

Assuming this is your only requirement (i.e. no reconsideration of your investments), the answer is quite straight forward:

  • Cash: Yuh is ok as long as you don’t use non-CHF currency. If you are using your card to pay in non-CHF currency, consider the Wir banking package.
  • Investments products: Interactive Brokers is the clear winner
  • Pillar 3a: Finpension is good
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4

As a start you could switch to the free package and get a separate (free) credit card.

Personally I’d recommend the separate credit card in any case, since it removes some friction when switching providers, making you less likely to stay for bad reasons.

(I’d still wouldn’t use UBS for investment, since I assume the fees are really not palatable compared to swiss quote/yuh)

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5

Thank you @gaijin @oslasho and @nabalzbhf for your feedback and advises.

@gaijin

I’m starting from a very low baseline and taking things one step at a time. Over the past two years I terminated two life‑insurance 3a and 3b policies, incurring losses in the process. Now I’m working on improving my current setup. I will revisit the investment products themselves in future iterations.

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6

Sounds like a well thought-out plan. Congrats on having gotten rid off the life-insurances!

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7

I understand that:

  • Interactive brokers is cheaper than Swissquotes
  • Swissquotes provides a pre-filled DA‑1 form for tax declaration.

As a beginner, how complex is it to fill out the DA‑1 form manually? I’m weighing convenience against cost.

Thank you again

8

Depends on your cantons tax software. In mine, it’s just clicking a checkbox.

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9

Separate the Broker expenses from Fund expenses.

You can use IBKR (low cost) to buy UCITS funds.

Then you don’t worry about DA-1 or estate tax issues.

EDIT: depends on the funds you want to buy and whether they are available in UCITS and don’t have much higher cost to hold them than their US domiciled counterparts ( I.e expense ratio and dividend withholding tax loss)

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10

Technically, this is not true. As mentioned by @logitacher every canton has their own DA-1 form. Since this is not a standardized process, it is not possible for a broker to provide you with a DA-1 form.
However, there is something called an eSteuerauszug / eRelevé fiscal. This is something that most Swiss brokers will provide. Since Interactive brokers is a US broker, they don’t provide an eSteuerauszug. An eSteuerauszug is a standardized list of all your assets and transactions which is accepted in all cantons. It removes the work of manually entering this information in the tax software of your canton.
If you prefer the convenience of such an eSteuerauszug, these are the options for three brokers:

  • Swissquote: you pay a fee (CHF 50-100)
  • Saxo: free
  • Interactive Brokers: you order from datalevel, a third party. I fully trust them. The price is CHF 50.

You might have noticed that I mentioned a third broker: Saxo. If you would like a Swiss broker, Saxo would be my recommendation (not Swissquote).

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11

Thank you @logitacher @covfefe and @gaijin for your explanations.

12

It really isn’t, if I can do it then so can you, look here Tax declarations are fun - #334 by Mirager

There’s a generic DA-1/R-US 164 form from the Confederation, but each Canton have their own, they’re essentially the same. I don’t know if they are embedded in all Cantonal tax agency platforms, seems some like VD don’t have it based on the convo I linked.

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13

Just for completeness: You can also do this for free in a DIY manner (OpenSteuerAuszug: generate your own eTax / eSteuerauszug for IBKR, Schwab and others). But given OPs step-by-step plan, the ‘convenience’ of Datalevel is probably worth the 50.-.

1 Like