The judgment of July 9, 2025 of the Court of Cassation No. 24-19.647 marks a turnaround: this risk must be evaluated throughout the duration of the loan, including the exchange risk but also events such as dismissal, retirement, or the sale of the property.
I. On the cancellation of abusive clauses.
A) The risk of exchange.
The reimbursement mechanism in fine or at constant deadlines in a foreign currency has led to an amplification of the debt. The example of ” negative damping »Lived by the victims of the Helvet Immo – debt having increased up to 30-45 % – shows the extent of the financial damage suffered.
The Court of Cassation in the aforementioned judgment stresses that the lender must inform the borrower on:
« the concrete functioning of the contractual mechanism […] especially in the event of depreciation of the national currency or loss of income in foreign currency ».
This absence of information creates an imbalance between the parties: the borrower does not measure the potentially catastrophic effects of the exchange rate which will be applied to the loan contract in currency throughout the duration of the loan.
The loan clauses and the information communicated by the banking establishment should carefully be carefully studied.
B) The obstacle to resale.
The borrowers sometimes find themselves in a situation where it is impossible to sell their property (located in the euro zone) without undergoing a heavy financial loss, aggravated by the volatility of the exchange rate and the contraction of the rents, sometimes leading to the seizure of real estate or to the resale at a brades of said property.
It is important to mention this situation.
C) Events that may provide for the duration of the loan.
The Court of Cassation reaffirms that the lender must evoke the unfavorable possible scenarios, including a job loss or a return to the euro zone without income in CHF.
The absence of such warnings generates an imbalance between the parties, justifying the cancellation of the abusive loan clauses.
A quantified simulation must be communicated to the borrower in order to implement the imperative principle of transparency as required by jurisprudence.
II. Retroactive effect and action roads.
The judgment, published in the Bulletin, applies immediately and retroactively to the ongoing currency loans.
The borrowers now have a solid legal basis to initiate legal action and obtain the cancellation of the abusive clauses of the loans in currency and, therefore, the reimbursement of the interest paid as well as the difference in the exchange rate.
The judgment n ° 24-19.647 of July 9, 2025 is a real jurisprudential turning point: it extends protection against loans in Swiss francs qualified as “”toxic“To all the borrowers they receive income in euros or in Swiss francs.
