Pillar 3a comparison 2024 – find the right provider

Letztes Update: 1. November 2024

VIAC offered the first digital, cost-effective product for pillar 3a at the end of 2017. At the end of 2023, VIAC had over 92,000 customers and managed assets of over CHF 2.97 billion. In terms of number of customers and assets under management, there is still a lot of room for improvement. After all, the assets held in 3a solutions (securities and account solutions) in Switzerland are estimated at CHF 120 billion.
A lot has happened since VIAC entered the market and other providers have appeared on the pillar 3a market with digital and cost-effective solutions. What products are available and how do they differ? Find out in this pillar 3a comparison.

At the very end of the post, you’ll find exciting perks from the providers.

Pillar 3a comparison – Pillar 3a interest rate comparison

WP Data Tables

Last update of the table: November 1, 2024
*plus issue and redemption fees for indexed products
If the table is distorted, please reload the page in your browser

You can find a comparison of the fees for an early withdrawal here.

You can find more detailed information about the providers below. If you want to jump directly to a provider and not read through everything, then choose the one you want here:

Clicking on a logo will take you directly to the website of the respective provider. I will not receive any compensation as a result.
The order of providers is based on the time of market entry.

Freya Savings and Sparbatze have ceased operations and therefore no longer appear in this comparison.

VIAC

About the provider

Let’s start with the oldest player VIAC. When VIAC launched, only one app existed. In the meantime, you can also manage your Pillar 3a via laptop or desktop.

Strategies

VIAC certainly offers the widest range of products and the greatest degree of customization of all suppliers. In addition to global, Swiss and sustainable strategies, you can also create your own strategy. The funds used are either from Credit Suisse or Swisscanto. The custodian bank of the Swisscanto funds is Zürcher Kantonalbank.

Sustainability

Since August 2021, the new “CSIF Equity Switzerland Total Market ESG”, which tracks the SPI ESG Index, has been used. As a result, a sustainability filter is now also applied to Swiss equities. You can find details about this ESG index in this blog post.

Special

VIAC has an internal netting system: before the trading orders are placed externally, they are all collected internally and offset against each other.
The same pooling and netting takes place with foreign currencies: Some of the index funds used are quoted in foreign currencies, and WIR Bank charges a premium of 0.5% when foreign currencies are exchanged. However, since VIAC first pools all trading orders of all customers and, as far as possible, settles them internally, the average surcharge is only 0.3% according to VIAC, and of course only on the funds that are traded in foreign currencies.
The very good FAQs should be emphasized in this context; you can tell that the provider has been on the market for a long time and knows what customers are asking.

In VIAC’s standard strategies, you can now choose whether to invest in bonds or not. If you decide against bonds, the portion that is not invested in shares is held as pension assets and currently earns interest at 0.95%. The great thing is that there is no administrative fee on this part.

The start-up now also offers a vested benefits solution.
Since fall 2020, VIAC has provided you with free death or disability insurance. For every CHF 10,000 of invested assets, you receive insurance cover of CHF 2,500 free of charge.
The maximum administration fee at VIAC is 0.40%.

Selma

About the provider

In mid-November 2019, almost two years later, Selma became the second provider to go live with its Pillar 3a product. So you can let Selma manage both your discretionary assets under the robo-advisor and your third pillar – all under one roof. I have already introduced Selma to you as a robo-advisor here.

The robo-advisor offers its pillar 3a product in collaboration with VermögensZentrum VZ.
The VZ was founded in 1993 to bring transparency to the Swiss insurance and banking business. According to their website, VermögensZentrum develops concepts to optimize their clients’ income, assets and taxes. Likewise, the VZ can take over the implementation of these concepts. So they not only advise, but also act as mortgage and asset managers.

I often come across interesting products on the VZ website, but the information about them is extremely sparse and not easy to find. Either you have to request a consultation, or you can order a fact sheet, which will come in the mail. The entry threshold is therefore much too high. I don’t want to be talked down to by a consultant before I can compare products. I have nothing at all against personal consultation, but I want to be able to go into a conversation informed. Otherwise, the consultant has too much of a “home field advantage.” But perhaps the VermögensZentrum’s offering is simply aimed at customers who want advice, rather than do-it-yourself investors.

Strategies

Selma offers a total of six strategies, each of which differs only in the proportion of shares.

Sustainability

In spring 2021, the financial products used in pillar 3a were replaced with more sustainable ones. Selma has thus responded to a widespread customer need.

Special

The more you have invested with Selma, the lower the fees. You can read more about it here.

In the Swiss portion of the portfolio, companies paying higher dividends as well as smaller and medium-sized companies (small and mid caps) are weighted higher. In addition to equities, the strategies include real estate, precious metals, commodities and specialties.
VZ uses both ETFs and index funds from various providers. This additionally increases diversification.

Descartes

About the provider

Shortly after Selma, at the end of November 2019, Descartes also entered the pension business. Descartes had already been active as a digital asset manager on the market for private investors since 2016.

Strategies

Descartes relies on OLZ funds for its pillar 3a product with the “Minimum Risk” investment model. This asset manager – founded in 2001 – constructs efficient securities portfolios based on a scientifically sound investment concept. Main focus is on both sustainability and minimum variance approach. In this investment concept, the optimal weighting of individual stocks is determined on the basis of forecast risk parameters (volatility and correlation). In this way, a higher return can be achieved with a higher equity allocation and the same risk.
The “Passive” investment model with sustainable index funds from Swisscanto has also recently become available. Descartes’ passive investment model performed best in the “Dynamic” category (65 to 85% equities) in the 2024 Handelszeitung pillar 3a fund comparison.

Sustainability

All securities in the “Minimum Risk” investment model come from companies that act in an exemplary manner in all ESG areas and meet the strict criteria. Companies with lower CO2 emissions are weighted more heavily than companies that have a greater impact on the climate. The _{carbon footprint} of the investment strategy is therefore at least 30 percent below that of the market index.
For the “Passive” investment model: exclusion of the companies with the worst ESG rating and reduction of the carbon intensity of the portfolio by 20% compared to the benchmark index.

Special

If you compare a factsheet of an OLZ fund with a market-weighted standard fund, you will notice, for example, that tech giants such as Apple, Google and Amazon do not have the largest weighting here. On the other hand, equities with low price fluctuations (volatility) are weighted more heavily.
There are also differences in the weighting, with the largest position in “OLZ – Equity World ex CH Optimized ESG” in mid-June 2024 being 1.86%. The otherwise all-powerful USA is only represented here with 16%. The largest position in the traditional “MSCI World ex CH” is 4.62%. The USA accounts for 73% of this figure.

The behavior of the OLZ funds during the 2022 crisis, which broke out due to the aftermath of coronavirus and the war in Ukraine, is interesting. While conventional index strategies in Switzerland fell by between 17% and 20%, the strategy based on the minimum variance principle with OLZ funds only lost just under 10%. It should be noted, however, that the recovery after 2022 was not quite as fulminant due to the comparatively low weighting of tech stocks.

The “Minimum Risk” investment model does not invest in commodity or real estate funds.

Meanwhile, a vested benefits solution is also available. You can read my review of the vested benefits custody account from Descartes here.
And here you can read about my experiences with Descartes Invest, the investment solution for free assets.

Frankly

About the provider

I have already presented the product of the Zürcher Kantonalbank’s Pension Foundation Savings 3, which was launched on the market in March 2020, in more detail here.

Strategies

A distinction is made here between active and passive strategies. As you already know, passive strategies follow an index that they try to track as closely as possible. In active strategies, fund managers make selections and thereby try to beat the market (index). Studies have repeatedly shown that this is only very rarely successful over longer periods of time. I myself am a big fan of passive strategies.

Sustainability

The actively managed funds have been subject to the Responsible Standard since October 2020. This takes into account the integration of ESG criteria (environmental, social, governance) and aligns investments to achieve an annual reduction in CO2 emissions of four percent. Since 2023, strictly sustainable (sutstainable) funds have also been available.
The sustainability criteria are less pronounced for index-linked funds: companies that produce banned weapons (cluster bombs, biological and chemical weapons, nuclear weapons, etc.) are excluded. Swisscanto writes that it assumes its responsibility by means of voting rights and active dialog with the companies. On their website you can see how Swisscanto has voted at the General Meetings.

Special

At frankly, you can change the investment mode to “independent” and decide yourself when and how much to invest. No all-in fee is charged on the pure account balance (cash). In return, the credit balance currently earns interest at 0.5%. This can be particularly interesting if you want to invest a larger amount of an existing pure 3a account gradually.

finpension

About the provider

In addition to the 1e collective foundation yourpension, which has been on the market since 2016 and offers a pension fund solution for management, and the vested benefits foundation valuepension, which followed a year later, finpension made it possible to invest cost-effectively in pillar 3a in late fall 2020. You can read the details in the detailed finpension experience report.

Strategies

finpension uses institutional index funds from Credit Suisse and Swisscanto. The following investment focuses are available: Global, Switzerland and Sustainable. You can customize the strategies, and a crypto fund is also available.
In the standard strategies, finpension places a greater emphasis on small caps than other providers.
The simple and transparent flat fee is the same for all strategies and all equity shares.

Sustainability

In its Sustainable strategy, finpension uses the ESG index funds of Credit Suisse. These funds are largely based on MSCI’s ESG Leaders indices. The best-in-class approach is applied. Only the best-rated companies in the respective sector remain in the index. In addition, companies are screened out according to certain exclusion criteria.
At the Swisscanto fund house, finpension relies on Swisscanto’s Responsible Index Funds. Here, too, exclusion criteria are applied and attention is paid to a targeted reduction in the carbon intensity of the portfolio by at least 20 percent compared to the standard reference index.

Special

Where possible, finpension invests funds in Swiss francs, and where the currency still has to be exchanged, finpension does not charge a margin on currency exchange.
The strategy comparison on the finpension website is well done. There you can compare the charts of up to six strategies.
finpension was the first Swiss provider to make it possible to invest in cryptocurrencies within pillar 3a, whereby you can invest a maximum of 5% of your personal 3a assets in the “Crypto Market Index Fund”. This fund was approved by the Swiss Financial Supervisory Authority Finma in September 2021 as the first Swiss crypto fund.

Depending on the strategy, a portion is invested in real estate funds, and no investments are made in commodity funds in the standard strategies. However, gold funds are available in the proprietary strategies.

Recently, finpension also began offering a cost-effective investment option for free assets. Read about my experiences with finpension Invest.

Inyova

About the provider

At Inyova you can already invest your money in free assets since 2017. According to its website, Inyova aims to make it easy for even financial novices to invest in a sustainable and responsible future. You can read more about Inyova for free assets in my post here – much is the same or similar for Pillar 3a. Main differences are: Different fee structure and the transaction bank is not Saxo Bank Switzerland, but Liberty 3a Vorsorgestiftung.

Strategies

The special thing about Inyova is that you do not invest in prefabricated funds, but receive an individually compiled portfolio of 30 to 40 stocks. In pillar 3a, your money is invested in individual shares with Inyova from a minimum investment of CHF 100. To make this possible even for such small amounts, Inyova uses fractional shares.

First, determine your impact topics. These are structured as follows:

• Handprint: What a company produces or supplies. For example: renewable energy or better education, a total of 12 topics are available for selection here.
• Footprint: How a company does business. For example: human rights or carbon footprint. Here are four topics to choose from.
• Exclusion criteria: You can exclude eight business areas here. The choices are, for example: no nuclear energy or no weapons.

After determining the risk profile, you have insight into each individual company in which investments are made. Short information blocks provide an overview of the business areas of the respective company. If one does not match your convictions, you can simply exclude it.
Inyova diversifies your portfolio so that you are invested in shares from different countries, currencies, industries and market capitalizations. Each company ultimately has a weight of two to three percent.

Sustainability

Everyone understands sustainability differently, and there is no single definition of it in the financial industry. With Inyova you can invest according to your personal sustainability values. No other provider currently offers this level of customization.
Depending on your risk profile, part of your assets will be invested in a bond ETF. A green bond ETF is used. Your money thus funds projects that have specific, traceable environmental goals.

Special

By the way, you can create a free strategy and see all the companies you would invest in. After that you can decide if you want to mess with Inyova.

No investments are made in commodity or real estate funds.

True Wealth

About the provider

The online wealth platform True Wealth was founded back in 2013, now has 12,500 clients and manages more than CHF 800 million in assets. True Wealth launched its Pillar 3a in the fall of 2022. Before, you could only let True Wealth manage your free assets. You can find a detailed article on True Wealth’s Pillar 3a here.

Strategies

Ten questions are used to determine your risk tolerance. Based on the result, True Wealth creates a portfolio of ETFs and index funds for you. This is customizable, so you can influence the weighting in certain ranges. The following categories are available for selection: Cash, Bonds, Real Estate Stocks, Commodities, Equities. In these categories there are then further subcategories. For example, in the case of equities, the world regions can be weighted individually.

Sustainability

You can choose between the investment universe “Global” and “Sustainable”. Product fees are slightly higher for the sustainable investment universe. The ETFs used form an SRI (Socially Responsible Investing) Index off.

Special

Currently, True Wealth waives management fees. However, according to the cost regulations of the 3a Digital Pension Foundation, True Wealth could introduce a flat-rate management fee of 0.225% on securities in the future.
You only have to determine the investment mix once. It applies to both the free assets and the tied assets in pillar 3a.
True Wealth automatically creates up to five pension accounts so that you can withdraw your pillar 3a assets in stages when you retire.
There is no minimum investment amount in True Wealth’s pillar 3a. Fractional shares of ETFs and index funds are used to ensure that smaller portfolios are also optimally diversified.
There is 1% interest on the cash.

Yuh

About the provider

The Yuh finance app was developed by PostFinance and Swissquote and has been on the market since May 2021. Lienhardt & Partner Privatbank acts as custodian bank for Yuh’s Pillar 3a, while Zurich-based wealth tech Descartes contributes the technological platform. The strategies are implemented with Swisscanto index funds of Zürcher Kantonalbank. You can find more details in my Yuh testimonial.

Strategies

A total of five different investment strategies are available, ranging from “mild” with an equity share of 20% to “fiery” with an equity share of 99%. Investments are made from an amount of CHF 10.

Sustainability

Yuh uses Swisscanto’s “Responsible” funds. ESG criteria (environmental, social and ethical criteria) are taken into account and exclusions and CO2e optimizations are performed.

Special

Yuh is not just a pillar 3a app, but a complete financial app. In addition to a free Mastercard, you get a fully-fledged bank account including a savings account with attractive interest rates. You can also invest in shares, ETFs and cryptocurrencies within the finance app at favorable conditions.
You can currently only open one pillar 3a account with Yuh, but in future it will be possible to open several so that you can stagger the various accounts and save tax.

Depending on the strategy, Yuh’s Pillar 3a invests in real estate funds and physical gold in addition to equities and bonds.

Details on the products used and on pillar 3a

Conclusion

All eight providers certainly do not offer bad products. If you want to decide on a provider, it’s best to take a closer look at the respective homepages and factsheets of the products. Especially in the case of sustainable products, it is advisable to take a closer look to check whether your sustainability standards are reasonably in line with those of the suppliers.

You want to know in more detail what’s in your third pillar, or how differently the providers invest? Then read my follow-up post with the strategy comparison now.

And to be honest, if that’s too tedious for you: all the providers presented here are good in their own way and you can therefore simply choose a provider blindly – the main thing is that you take your pension provision into your own hands.

If you’re interested in how I do it: I’m with finpension and I have a second pillar 3a with Descartes. I find their minimum variance strategy a super alternative to the standard index weighting. How do you do it? Write it in the comments below.

By the way, it doesn’t hurt to have several Pillar 3a accounts or Pillar 3a custody accounts. At retirement, you can then withdraw the credit in stages. This way you break the tax progression and you can benefit from lower capital benefit taxes. You can read the details in the article on staggered Pillar 3a withdrawals.

Another advantage of multiple 3a columns: You can drive different strategies. One for example as an account solution, the other with 100% shares or once market capitalized and once according to the minimum variance strategy…

Coupon codes

If you open an account with the voucher codes bez. a securities account, you will receive a fee voucher or trading credit and I will receive compensation from the providers. Most of the time this is equal to the amount of your voucher.

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