---
date: 2026-04-30
type: market-cap-comparison
claim: Ethereum's market cap is approximately 1.4× the combined market cap of all Swiss banks listed on SIX
displayed-on: /party-programmes (Why-this-matters tiles)
---

# Ethereum vs Swiss listed banks — market cap snapshot, 30 April 2026

This document records the inputs, sources, and arithmetic behind the "1.4×" tile on the Party Programmes page. It is the audit history for that single number. Re-run quarterly (or whenever ETH or the Swiss banking sector moves more than ±15%) and supersede with a new dated file.

## TL;DR

- **ETH market cap:** $273.4B → **CHF 216.0B**
- **All Swiss banks listed on SIX (combined):** **CHF ≈ 158B**
- **Ratio:** 216.0 / 158 ≈ **1.37×** → rounded to **1.4×** for the tile

## FX rate used

- USD/CHF: **0.7901** (1 USD = 0.79 CHF), as of 29 April 2026
- Source: Federal Reserve H.10, OFX historical, TradingEconomics (cross-checked, all within 0.001)

## Numerator — Ethereum

| Metric | Value | Source |
| --- | ---: | --- |
| ETH price | $2,315.11 | Fortune market summary, 29 April 2026 09:30 ET |
| ETH market cap (USD) | $273.4B | CoinMarketCap, live |
| ETH market cap (CHF, at 0.79) | **CHF 216.0B** | computed |

Why "Swiss-born": Stiftung Ethereum was registered in Zug in July 2014; the protocol's pre-sale ran from there. The protocol itself is decentralised and not a Swiss economic asset in any meaningful tax/employment sense — the framing is historical, not economic.

## Denominator — Swiss banks listed on SIX Swiss Exchange

All values in CHF billion. Figures marked **(verified)** were taken from a direct lookup; figures marked **(estimated)** were derived from share price × estimated shares outstanding and may be off by ±10%.

| Bank | Ticker | Market cap (CHF B) | Confidence |
| --- | --- | ---: | --- |
| UBS Group | UBSG | 105.0 | verified (companiesmarketcap, $134B / 0.79 = CHF 105B; Bloomberg cross-check) |
| Julius Baer Group | BAER | 12.6 | verified ($16B / 0.79; companiesmarketcap) |
| Banque Cantonale Vaudoise | BCVN | 8.0 | verified (themarket.ch) |
| EFG International | EFGN | 5.2 | estimated (price 17.96 × ~290M shares) |
| Vontobel Holding | VONN | 3.9 | verified (Simply Wall St, 6 April 2026) |
| Cembra Money Bank | CMBN | 3.5 | verified (MarketScreener) |
| Basler Kantonalbank | BSKP | 3.4 | verified (boersennews.de) |
| St. Galler Kantonalbank | SGKN | 3.0 | verified (companiesmarketcap, "over CHF 3B") |
| Valiant Holding | VATN | 2.3 | estimated (price 141.40 × ~16M shares) |
| Luzerner Kantonalbank | LUKN | 1.7 | estimated |
| Berner Kantonalbank | BEKN | 1.5 | estimated |
| Basellandschaftliche Kantonalbank | BLKB | 1.5 | estimated |
| Thurgauer Kantonalbank | TKBP | 1.3 | estimated |
| Graubündner Kantonalbank | GRKP | 1.0 | estimated |
| Walliser Kantonalbank | WKBN | 1.0 | estimated |
| Zuger Kantonalbank | ZUGN | 1.0 | estimated |
| VP Bank | VPBN | 0.6 | estimated |
| Glarner Kantonalbank | GLKBN | 0.2 | estimated |
| Banque Cantonale du Jura | n/a (CB-JU) | 0.1 | estimated |
| **Total** | | **≈ 156.8** | |

Rounded to **CHF 158B** for the tile to leave headroom for any listed bank we missed.

### Banks included

All issuers listed on SIX Swiss Exchange whose primary GICS classification is **"Banks"** or **"Diversified Financials → Capital Markets"** (Vontobel) and whose business is Swiss retail/private/wholesale banking. UBS is included in full (it is domiciled in Zurich and its primary listing is on SIX). Julius Baer counts; Vontobel counts (treated as a bank-equivalent by the SXI Banks index).

### Banks excluded and why

- **Raiffeisen Schweiz** — cooperative, not publicly listed
- **Zürcher Kantonalbank (ZKB)** — not publicly listed; Partizipationsscheine exist but are not common equity
- **PostFinance** — wholly owned subsidiary of Swiss Post, not separately listed
- **Migros Bank** — privately owned by Migros co-op
- **Most cantonal banks (e.g., Aargauer KB, Schwyzer KB, Nidwaldner KB, Obwaldner KB, Appenzeller KB)** — not listed on SIX (state-owned without traded equity)
- **Foreign-owned Swiss banking subsidiaries** (e.g., HSBC Private Bank Suisse, Lombard Odier as a partnership) — either not listed or no separately traded Swiss equity
- **Insurance and asset managers** without a banking license (e.g., Swisscom, Partners Group)
- **Crypto-only banks** (Sygnum, AMINA Bank) — not listed on SIX as common equity

The exclusion list is much larger than the inclusion list. This is the key methodological point: the Swiss banking sector is mostly *not* publicly traded (cooperatives, cantonal-state-owned entities, private partnerships). The 1.4× claim compares ETH to the *listed* slice of the sector. If you compare ETH to the *total* Swiss banking sector by assets or revenue, ETH is much smaller — but as listed equity market cap (which is what the public can buy), ETH is larger.

## Sensitivity analysis

| Scenario | Ratio |
| --- | ---: |
| ETH +20%, banks unchanged | 1.65× |
| ETH unchanged, banks +20% | 1.14× |
| ETH −20%, banks +20% | 0.91× (ETH no longer larger) |
| Estimate error ±10% on smaller banks (≈ ±CHF 6B) | 1.32–1.43× |

The "1.4×" headline holds across normal market noise. It would flip below 1× only on a combined ETH crash + Swiss banking rally of ≈30% combined.

## Reproduction

To re-run this comparison:

1. Pull live ETH market cap from CoinMarketCap or CoinGecko (USD).
2. Pull current USD/CHF from Fed H.10 or OFX.
3. Look up each bank ticker on SIX (or companiesmarketcap.com / Bloomberg) for current market cap; convert to CHF if quoted in USD.
4. Sum the bank market caps, divide ETH/CHF by that sum.

If the ratio drops below 1.2× or rises above 1.6×, supersede this file with a new dated audit and update the tile in `pages/party-programmes.tsx` (`WHY_MATTERS_STATS`) accordingly.

## Sources

- [CoinMarketCap — Ethereum](https://coinmarketcap.com/currencies/ethereum/)
- [Companiesmarketcap — UBS](https://companiesmarketcap.com/ubs/marketcap/)
- [Companiesmarketcap — Julius Baer](https://companiesmarketcap.com/julius-baer/marketcap/)
- [Simply Wall St — Vontobel Holding](https://simplywall.st/stocks/ch/diversified-financials/vtx-vonn/vontobel-holding-shares)
- [MarketScreener — Cembra Money Bank](https://www.marketscreener.com/quote/stock/CEMBRA-MONEY-BANK-AG-149356574/)
- [TheMarket — Kantonalbanken analysis](https://themarket.ch/analyse/was-aktien-von-kantonalbanken-zu-einer-langfristinvestition-praedestiniert-ld.7898)
- [Fed H.10 — USD/CHF historical](https://www.federalreserve.gov/releases/h10/hist/dat00_sz.htm)
- [SIX Swiss Exchange — equity market data](https://www.six-group.com/en/products-services/the-swiss-stock-exchange/market-data.html)