FINMA Appoints Alain Girard as Head of Banks Division

2026-02-20 - 07:53

FINMA’s Board of Directors has appointed Alain Girard as Head of the Banks division, effective 1 April 2026. Girard, 45, currently leads FINMA’s Recovery and Resolution division and is a member of the Executive Board. He succeeds Thomas Hirschi, who left FINMA on 31 August 2025. Since then, the division has been managed on an interim basis by Simon Brönnimann, who will gradually hand over responsibilities and assume leadership of the Recovery and Resolution division ad interim. Girard has led the Recovery and Resolution division since 2022 and was part of the crisis unit responding to the Credit Suisse situation. He represents FINMA in the Financial Stability Board’s Resolution Steering Group and is a member of the High-Level Task Force for Bail-in Execution. From 2019 to 2022, he headed FINMA’s Supervision of Small Banks and Securities Firms section within the Banks division and contributed to regulatory projects including the introduction of the small banks regime. Prior to joining FINMA in 2015, he worked as a lawyer in Zurich. Brönnimann, who has led the Banks division on an interim basis since September 2025, joined FINMA in 2007 and has held various management positions in both large and small bank supervision. Commenting on the appointment, FINMA CEO Stefan Walter said: Stefan Walter “We have an excellent internal replacement for the important role of Head of Banking Supervision in Alain Girard. This will enable work to continue smoothly in a turbulent and challenging time. Alain Girard is a strategically strong, senior leader with crisis experience and a large network, especially among supervisors worldwide.” Featured image credit: Edited by Fintech News Switzerland, based on image by mkmult via Freepik