Bankruptcies and liquidations in Switzerland: the live list, and what the terms actually mean

When a Swiss company gets into trouble, the commercial register says so, in public, in precise legal language. Knowing how to read that language answers the most important due-diligence question there is: is the company I am about to deal with still fully alive? This guide explains the three states you will encounter and where to monitor them for free.

The three register states, in plain language

In liquidation (in Liquidation, en liquidation): the company has been dissolved and is winding up. This can be voluntary (the owners decided to close) or ordered, for example after a bankruptcy opening. The company still exists legally, its name usually carries the suffix in Liquidation, and a liquidator is entered in the register. It can still complete existing business, but it is no longer a going concern in the normal sense.

Bankruptcy (Konkurs, faillite): a court has opened insolvency proceedings because the company cannot pay its debts. The opening, and later the closure or suspension of the proceedings, are announced in the SOGC. A bankruptcy normally leads into liquidation and, at the end, deletion from the register.

Struck off (geloescht, radiee): the entry has been deleted from the register. The company has ceased to exist as a legal entity. Deletion is the final step after a completed liquidation, and it too is published in the SOGC.

Where these events are announced

Every one of these steps must be published in the Swiss Official Gazette of Commerce (SOGC / SHAB / FOSC), the official daily gazette of register changes. That makes the gazette the single authoritative stream for distress signals, and it is public. The practical problem is volume: the gazette publishes hundreds of notices every business day, in three languages, in free text.

Regista reads the gazette every business day, classifies each publication, and keeps a running list of companies entering liquidation or being struck off, filterable by canton and event type, each entry dated with its SOGC publication and linked to the company dossier. The list is free.

What a liquidation entry does and does not tell you

A register event is a fact, not a rating. An entry in liquidation tells you the company is winding up per the SOGC publication of the stated date. It does not tell you why, it says nothing about the solvency of the people involved, and it is not a creditworthiness assessment. Treat it as the starting point for a conversation, not as a verdict. For the authoritative record, always consult the official cantonal extract, which every Regista dossier links to.

Monitoring your own counterparties

The list answers the market-wide question. For your own exposure, the more useful tool is monitoring: follow the companies you work with, and get an email the day one of them files a register change, including a liquidation or a deletion. On Regista this is part of the Pro plan, built on the same daily gazette data.