Swiss companies looking to trade with Cuba face an almost insurmountable obstacle: while they can issue orders, invoices, and guarantees with Cuban state banks, they rarely succeed in receiving payment.
This is how Ursin Mirer, president of SwissCubanCham, the Swiss-Cuban Chamber of Commerce, describes it in an article by the international service of Swiss public broadcasting (Swissinfo) that depicts the collapse of bilateral trade in 2026.
The trigger is the unprecedented tightening of U.S. sanctions against Cuba, which has forced banks and financial providers in Europe and Latin America to cut or drastically reduce their exposure to any transactions linked to the island.
Based on the information gathered by Swissinfo, these are the main reasons why Swiss companies face difficulties —and in some cases are virtually unable— to collect payment for services rendered to Cuba:
1. Chronic foreign currency shortage in Cuba. The State and Cuban entities lack sufficient foreign currency to regularly meet their obligations with international suppliers. This is one of the fundamental structural issues.
2. Defaults and Delays by Cuban State Entities. State banks can issue payment orders, invoices, or guarantees, but according to the Swiss-Cuban Chamber of Commerce, foreign companies often encounter significant difficulties when attempting to collect payments.
3. Lack of guarantees for foreign companies. Swiss companies operate in a market where they find the legal security and protection of their investments and contracts to be insufficient.
4. Fear of international banks regarding U.S. sanctions. European and Latin American financial institutions avoid processing certain transactions related to Cuba in order to reduce the risk of being exposed to U.S. measures.
5. Application of the so-called de-risking. Many banks prefer to directly limit or cancel business relationships linked to Cuba, even when a specific transaction could be legal, because the cost and risk of verifying it do not justify it.
6. Possible connection of transfers with the U.S. financial system. A transaction conducted between European companies may go through a correspondent bank in the United States, especially when the dollar is involved. This connection may subject the transaction to U.S. controls.
7. Automatic banking controls on companies linked to Cuba. Compliance systems can identify a company as being related to Cuba and subject its transfers to additional controls, even when certain transactions pertain to business conducted in third countries.
8. Extraterritorial Effect of U.S. Sanctions. The fear of losing access to the U.S. market or financial system prompts entities from third countries to avoid Cuban operations, even if their own legislation does not explicitly prohibit them.
9. Limited effectiveness of European protection measures. The Blocking Statute of the European Union aims to protect companies against certain U.S. extraterritorial sanctions, but in practice, it does not prevent banks from adopting more restrictive internal policies.
10. Gradual closure of alternative payment routes. Panama operated for years as an intermediary for certain financial transactions between Cuba and foreign companies, but its banks have also significantly restricted transactions related to the island.
11. Payment channels are increasingly expensive, slow, and insecure. As fewer banks are willing to process transactions related to Cuba, it becomes more challenging to find intermediaries capable of completing an international transfer.
12. Need to resort to extraordinary measures. The case of Caribbean Tours illustrates the extreme end of the problem: its owner claims that at times he has to personally transport cash to Cuba to pay hotels, guides, and other local suppliers.
13. Greater vulnerability of small and medium-sized enterprises. Swiss SMEs have less capacity to withstand months of delays, banking blockages, or non-payments, which has led many to reduce their operations or exit the Cuban market.
The problem does not have a single cause. On one hand, Cuba faces a severe liquidity crisis, accumulating difficulties in paying foreign suppliers and providing little assurance to businesses.
On the other hand, U.S. sanctions and, above all, the fear of international banks of being exposed to them drastically reduce the available channels to move money to or from the island.
The result is a particularly harmful combination: even if a Swiss company manages to sell a product or provide a service in Cuba, there are no guarantees that it will be able to get paid.
The figures reflect the collapse of commerce
The trade volume between Switzerland and Cuba dropped from over 2.7 million Swiss francs in 2025 to just 1 million in the first half of 2026. Exports of Swiss watches to Cuba, one of the most prominent categories, fell from 1.4 million francs the previous year to about 357,000 francs in the first six months of the year.
The turning point was the Executive Order 14404, issued by the Trump administration on May 1, 2026, which expanded the sanctions regime and introduced, for the first time, risks of secondary sanctions for non-U.S. companies.
On June 4, GAESA, MININT, and MINFAR were blocked under that order. The Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) provided a deadline until June 5 to cease operations with those entities.
Since that date, any foreign company that maintains ties with GAESA or with entities where it holds 50% or more is subject to penalties.
So far in 2026, Washington has launched at least nine rounds of sanctions against Cuba, targeting 31 individuals and 49 companies.
The banking problem is not new
PostFinance, the Swiss postal bank, had already closed its payment channel to Cuba on September 1, 2019, during Trump's first term, leaving numerous Swiss projects on the island without means of collection. That precedent marked the beginning of a gradual withdrawal from international banking.
The accumulated fines have deepened that aversion. In 2022, the Swiss company CA Indosuez Switzerland SA was sanctioned by OFAC with a settlement of $720,258 for violations of the embargo.
Additionally, there are the $608,825 paid by Key Holding, LLC for facilitating 36 cargo shipments to Cuba between January 2022 and July 2023, and the $507,375 that BitPay paid for processing bitcoin payments linked to residents on the island.
Switzerland, which in April 2023 had already announced the end of its development cooperation with Cuba for 2024, now sees its private trade with the island also collapsing.
The situation illustrates how the maximum pressure from Washington not only affects American companies but is also redrawing the boundaries of international trade with the Cuban regime, leaving Havana increasingly isolated from the global financial system.
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