SwissLife liable for losses from structured total investment product

Swisslife Pension Plan

In recent rulings, the Princely Court of Justice qualified an investment product consisting of several components as an overall product for the first time and clarified that SwissLife (Liechtenstein) AG, which sold the overall product, is liable to clients for all losses arising from the overall product. Our law firm acted as plaintiff’s representative.

The court clarified that the Swisslife Pension Plan product, which consists of a pension insurance policy, a foreign currency loan and various repayment vehicles, is an overall investment product designed and marketed by the legal predecessor CapitalLeben.

The court left no doubt that the entire product with all its components was marketed with the knowledge and intent of the insurance company. The insurance company was obliged to explain and inform about all components of the overall product and their risks and characteristics. The policyholder was incorrectly and incompletely informed about the characteristics and risks of the overall product when taking out the policy.

The court also held that the plaintiff’s claims were not time-barred. The decisive factor is when the plaintiff was aware that the purchased product did not correspond to the descriptions of the insurance. Due to the many components and the lack of overall information, it was not possible for the plaintiff to have an overall view or to assess the interaction of the various components of the complex product.

The decision represents a concretization of the previous case law of the Princely Supreme Court from 2016, which had already ruled in the past that the insurance company must also pay for the disadvantages of loan financing if the borrowing is not based on a separate independent decision of the policyholder. This case law is now being correctly extended to complex overall investment products.

9 | 2020