How Much Does Securities Tokenisation Cost? Fees 2026 (France & Switzerland)

2026 price ranges for a pre-issuance security token valuation in France and Switzerland.

Introduction: how much does securities tokenisation cost in 2026?

A pre-issuance valuation before tokenising securities generally costs between EUR/CHF 15,000 and 70,000 for an SME or a mid-cap, with multi-jurisdictional files or those involving several token classes exceeding this ceiling (Hectelion's 2026 practice). The right budget depends on one simple question before any other: how many classes of rights need to be modeled in the token, and under which regulatory framework does the issuance take place?

Securities tokenisation consists of representing financial rights, shares, bonds, partnership interests or receivables, as digital tokens recorded on a distributed ledger (DLT). Before any issuance, a security token must be backed by a defensible value: that is the purpose of the pre-issuance valuation, comparable in its methodological rigor to a classic business valuation, as the Autorité des marchés financiers notes in its positions on digital assets treated as financial instruments.

"A registered uncertificated security is any right presenting the following characteristics by agreement between the parties: it is entered in a ledger of uncertificated securities, and it can only be asserted and transferred through that ledger.", Art. 973d of the Swiss Code of Obligations, from the federal act of 25 September 2020 on the adaptation of federal law to developments in distributed ledger technology, in force since 1 February 2021.

Three factors make this budget hard to anticipate in 2026.

First, the persistent confusion between securities tokenisation, which falls under classic financial law (MiFID II, transferable securities), and crypto-asset issuance under the European MiCA regulation, which expressly excludes financial instruments from its scope: two different regimes, two different levels of requirement.

Second, the growing weight of the European DLT Pilot Regime (Regulation (EU) 2022/858), which opens trading and settlement of tokenised securities under ESMA supervision, but imposes additional checks.

Third, the growing number of France-Switzerland projects, which must reconcile the loi PACTE and the PSAN regime on the French side with the federal act adapting the law to distributed ledger technology (the DLT Act) and FINMA guidelines on the Swiss side.

This article gives 2026 price ranges at a glance for France and Switzerland, details what drives the bill, explains how a pre-issuance valuation is billed, situates Hectelion's pricing, describes the course of an engagement and its timeline, compares providers, explains how to reduce cost without losing defensibility, presents 2026 trends, lists the five costliest mistakes, then illustrates it all with two priced cases in France and Switzerland, before answering the ten most frequent questions.

The cost of a securities tokenisation at a glance: 2026 ranges (France & Switzerland)

Engagement tier	France (EUR)	Switzerland (CHF)	Indicative timeline
Simplified pre-issuance valuation (one asset, one token class, raise under 2M)	EUR 15,000 to 30,000	CHF 18,000 to 35,000	3 to 5 weeks
Standard pre-issuance valuation (several rights classes, raise of 2 to 15M)	EUR 30,000 to 70,000	CHF 35,000 to 80,000	6 to 10 weeks
Complex pre-issuance valuation (multi-jurisdiction, DLT structuring, PSAN/FINMA coordination)	From EUR 70,000, no fixed ceiling	From CHF 80,000, no fixed ceiling	10 to 16 weeks

Ranges based on market practice observed by Hectelion in 2026, for engagements conducted in France and Switzerland, excluding tax and disbursements. They cover the pre-issuance valuation of the underlying securities and the value allocation across token classes, excluding legal structuring fees, tokenisation platform fees, and regulatory fees (AMF visa, PSAN registration, FINMA authorization where applicable).

Scope your tokenisation project before issuance

Before issuing a single token, a conversation with an independent firm helps scope the exact perimeter of the valuation and avoid costly rework later. Book a meeting with Hectelion for a first, no-obligation diagnostic of your security token project, before launching your regulatory file.

Acontos: get a free online estimate of your company's value

Before going into the details, know that Hectelion has developed Acontos, an online audit, due diligence and business valuation tool, powered by Anthropic's Claude Sonnet 5 artificial intelligence and calibrated on Hectelion's methodology. From your accounts, it produces a first estimate of your shares' value within minutes, free of charge and without retaining any document. Launch the valuation simulator to get an order of magnitude before tokenising, then keep reading to understand what drives the cost.

What drives the price: number of token classes, regulatory framework, legal complexity

Six factors explain most of the price gap between two engagements:

The number of rights classes represented by the tokens: a single token granting a homogeneous share of one asset is modeled quickly, while a structure combining equity tokens, debt tokens and tokens carrying governance rights requires a value allocation by class, following a comparables approach combined with option-pricing methods for conditional rights, close to those used in financial instrument valuation.
The regulatory framework chosen: an issuance falling solely under PSAN registration and a simple private placement requires fewer supporting documents than a file seeking the AMF's optional visa or falling under the European DLT Pilot Regime, which requires coordination with an authorized DLT market infrastructure provider. In Switzerland, registering securities as uncertificated securities under art. 973d of the Code of Obligations must be reconciled with the Financial Market Infrastructure Act when tokens are traded on an organized platform.
The quality and availability of the underlying asset's financial data, audited accounts, business plan, ongoing contracts, which drive the time needed for prior financial due diligence.
The number of jurisdictions involved in the targeted investor base: a strictly domestic raise is handled faster than a cross-border France-Switzerland or European raise.
The urgency of the issuance timeline: a file compressed into a few weeks mobilizes more resources in parallel and increases the flat fee.
The degree of automation already present in the issuance smart contract, which can either simplify or complicate verifying the economic rights actually encoded.

Flat fee or time-based: how the pre-issuance valuation engagement is billed

In market practice, the pre-issuance valuation is most often billed on a flat-fee basis, based on an engagement letter detailing the scope, the number of token classes to value and the expected deliverables, valuation report, per-class allocation memo, methodological summary for the regulatory file. The flat fee secures the issuer's budget and holds the firm accountable for the announced deadlines. Time-based billing, charged by time spent, remains reserved for engagements whose scope cannot be fixed in advance, for example when the token's legal structuring is still under discussion with the issuer's counsel at the time the engagement starts.

In both cases, disbursements remain separate from fees: travel expenses, sworn translation of documents, or occasional recourse to a peer specialized in digital asset taxation. In Hectelion's practice, more than eight engagements out of ten are billed on a flat-fee basis, with time-based billing reserved for files whose issuance structure is still evolving during the mandate.

Process and timeline: from pre-issuance valuation to security token issuance

Engagement letter that fixes the perimeter, the number of token classes and the targeted regulatory timeline.
Collection of the underlying asset's data and a first consistency check between the economic rights promised in the issuance documentation and those actually encoded in the ledger of uncertificated securities or the smart contract.
Application of the valuation methods chosen, income approach, market comparables or asset-based approach depending on the nature of the asset, followed by allocating value across the token classes issued.
Production of the report and its methodological summary, intended to be filed with the regulatory dossier, PSAN, AMF visa or FINMA notice as applicable.
Adversarial review with the issuer's legal counsel, as part of a coherent financial structuring of the deal, before the issuance is launched.

A simplified engagement wraps up in three to five weeks, a standard engagement in six to ten weeks, a complex multi-jurisdiction engagement in ten to sixteen weeks.

Comparing options: Big Four, independent boutique firms, tokenisation platforms

Big Four firms have teams dedicated to digital assets and suit large issuances backed by listed groups or institutions well, at correspondingly calibrated fees. Independent boutique firms, Hectelion among them, bring focused human expertise on valuation and file defensibility, with shorter timelines and a dual France-Switzerland reading useful for cross-border issuances. Technical tokenisation platforms, finally, operate the DLT infrastructure and token issuance but generally do not themselves carry out the pre-issuance valuation of the underlying securities: this piece remains an independent mandate, precisely to preserve the valuation's defensibility toward investors and the regulator. Each category has its place depending on the project's size and its degree of legal cross-border complexity.

Why Choose Hectelion Among These Categories

Eight concrete points set Hectelion apart from other providers:

A founder's perspective: Aristide Ruot has created and run his own companies, negotiated fundraising rounds and managed real cash-flow pressures, an experience that informs the reading of a tokenisation file well beyond a purely academic approach.
Fees calibrated to the perimeter: the rate follows the real number of token classes to be valued and the regulatory framework chosen, not a generic flat fee sized for a large institutional issuance.
A dual expertise held by a single person: valuing the underlying securities and the financial structuring of the transaction are both led by Aristide Ruot, Ph.D., which avoids information loss between a separate valuer and structurer.
A single point of contact: tokenisation, securities valuation, financial due diligence and instrument structuring move forward under the same team, without juxtaposing providers with sometimes incompatible methodologies.
The rigor of a large firm, without its footprint: a methodology aligned with IVSC standards and AMF/FINMA practice, applied with the responsiveness of a boutique firm rather than the timelines and fees of a large international network.
A natively France-Switzerland practice: the loi PACTE and the PSAN regime on the French side, the DLT Act and FINMA guidelines on the Swiss side, useful as soon as an issuance project targets investors from both countries.
Total economic independence: no commission collected on the amount raised, no ties to a tokenisation platform or an investor fund, which rules out any conflict of interest between the token price and the value opinion rendered.
Deadlines set and then held: the delivery timeline is fixed from the engagement letter, a necessary condition to avoid pushing back the token issuance date announced to investors.

Point of caution: a valuer compensated, even indirectly, by the tokenisation platform or by an intermediary earning a commission on the raise is exposed to a conflict of interest that investors and the regulator spot quickly; the total absence of any economic tie to these parties deserves to be verified before signing the engagement letter.

Debt token vs equity token: two risk profiles, two valuation methods

A token backed by a receivable, a tokenised loan or a bond, and a token backed by equity are not valued using the same logic, a distinction that the value allocation across classes alone does not always make explicit. A debt token entitles its holder to a contractually fixed flow, coupon and principal repayment, which brings its valuation close to that of a classic bond instrument: the exercise consists of discounting known flows at a rate reflecting the issuer's default risk, with a relatively narrow margin of uncertainty. An equity token, conversely, entitles its holder to a residual share of the underlying asset's value after creditors are satisfied, which exposes the holder to much greater variability and requires a significantly higher discount rate, as well as modeling exit scenarios, asset sale, IPO, buyback. A project that simultaneously issues both types of tokens on the same underlying asset, for example a senior debt token and a residual equity token on the same real estate program, must document this risk hierarchy in the value allocation, failing which the relative price of the two token classes does not reflect their actual economic profile.

Hectelion's pricing: fees adapted to the real perimeter

Hectelion bills its pre-issuance valuation engagements based on the real perimeter observed after an initial diagnostic, not on a generic flat fee applied to any security token issuance. The firm applies its economic independence from traditional financial intermediaries and tokenisation platforms: no commission is collected on the amount raised, which rules out any conflict of interest between the raise amount and the value opinion rendered. This independence, aligned with IVSC standards and AMF/SIX market practice, applies to engagements of 2 to 500 million (CHF or EUR), whether for an industrial SME or a technology group preparing an institutional tokenised raise.

How to reduce the cost of a tokenisation without losing defensibility

Prepare the documentation upfront: complete, up-to-date financial documentation, audited accounts, updated forecast, contracts listed, reduces the reconstruction time billed by the firm accordingly.
Limit the number of token classes to the strict economic necessary rather than multiplying rights categories for marketing reasons, each additional class adding a distinct value allocation to document.
Choose the simplest regulatory framework compatible with the raise's objective: a PSAN registration is often enough where a full AMF visa adds no proportionate value.
Pool the financial due diligence diagnostic with the valuation itself rather than engaging two separate providers on overlapping perimeters.

Conversely, reducing cost by dropping the value allocation by token class or relying on a generic valuation not specific to the issuance exposes the issuer, in the event of an audit or a dispute with token holders, to a challenge of the valuation communicated at issuance.

2026 trends: DLT Pilot Regime, MiCA, the rise of regulated security tokens

The European Pilot Regime for market infrastructures based on distributed ledger technology continues to scale up in 2026, with a growing number of issuers choosing to tokenise shares, bonds or collective investment scheme units under ESMA and national competent authority supervision. The MiCA regulation, phased in since 2024, has clarified the boundary between crypto-assets and tokenised financial instruments by expressly excluding the latter from its scope, which strengthens the role of the pre-issuance valuation as a central piece of the regulatory file rather than a mere formality. In addition, artificial intelligence speeds up the collection and consistency checking of the underlying asset's financial data, which reduces time billed on repetitive diligence without reducing the professional judgment required to validate the value-allocation assumptions across token classes. Finally, Switzerland is consolidating its position as a reference hub for issuing registered uncertificated securities since the DLT Act came into force, fueling a continuing rise in France-Switzerland files combining investors from both countries.

Custody of security tokens: an authorized custodian, a budget line often forgotten

A tokenisation project often frames its budget around the pre-issuance valuation and regulatory fees, forgetting a distinct but structuring line item: custody of the issued tokens. Once tokenised securities are offered to non-professional investors or traded on an organized platform, safekeeping the private keys and ownership registers falls in practice to an authorized custodian, distinct from the valuer and from the technical issuance platform. This choice is not neutral for the valuation itself: a robust custody setup, with clear segregation between client assets and issuer assets, reduces the risk perceived by institutional investors and can justify a less severe illiquidity discount than on a project where custody stays handled in-house by the issuer. Anticipating this custodian choice from the scoping of the valuation engagement, rather than after issuance, avoids having to revise the methodological note once the custody arrangement is finally settled.

The 5 mistakes that cost the most

Mistake 1: Confusing a security token with a utility token in the structuring

A token that confers a real economic right, dividend, share of gains, voting right, falls under securities law rather than the more flexible utility-token regime. Retroactively requalifying a utility token as a security token exposes the issuer to a complete rework of the regulatory file and the valuation, at a cost far higher than proper scoping from the outset.

Mistake 2: Starting the valuation after the smart contract is drafted

When the economic rights are already frozen in the token's code before any valuation, the valuer sometimes discovers inconsistencies between the issuance's commercial documentation and the rights actually encoded. Emergency fixes to the smart contract often cost more than having involved the valuer from the design of the token classes.

Mistake 3: Underestimating the illiquidity discount at launch

A security token's promise of liquidity only fully materializes once an active secondary market is established, which often takes several quarters after issuance. Ignoring the illiquidity discount applicable at this initial stage overvalues the token issued and exposes the issuer to investor challenges once the secondary market is actually observed.

Mistake 4: Choosing a provider not independent from the tokenisation platform

Having the pre-issuance valuation performed by the same entity that earns a commission on the volume raised creates a structural conflict of interest, potentially raised by a regulator or an unhappy token holder. A value opinion rendered by an independent firm, with no commission on the raise, remains the best guarantee of defensibility.

Mistake 5: Overlooking consistency between the two France-Switzerland regulatory frameworks

An issuance targeting investors from both countries must be structured to stay consistent with the loi PACTE and the PSAN regime on the French side as well as the DLT Act and FINMA guidelines on the Swiss side. Handling the two frameworks in isolation, rather than in a single coordinated engagement, frequently results in costly rework of the valuation file late in the process.

Case 1: real estate STO in France, pre-issuance valuation at EUR 32,000

Case built for illustrative purposes based on observed market practice.

Company D SAS, a real estate developer in Nouvelle-Aquitaine, wants to raise EUR 4,000,000 from a club of investors by tokenising the economic rights attached to a residential program under development, through the issuance of 40,000 tokens at EUR 100 each granting a share of rental income and disposal gains. A single token class is issued, the program's financial documentation is complete, and the issuance falls under PSAN registration without an AMF visa.

The quote comes to EUR 32,000, at the low end of the EUR 30,000 to 70,000 standard range, due to the single token class and the immediate availability of the asset's data. The engagement runs eight weeks and covers valuing the real estate program using an asset-based approach and discounted cash flows, allocating value across the 40,000 tokens issued, and the methodological note for the PSAN file.

Case 2: Swiss equity security token, pre-issuance valuation at CHF 68,000

Case built for illustrative purposes based on observed market practice.

Company E SA, an industrial software publisher based in French-speaking Switzerland, is preparing a CHF 6,000,000 raise from Swiss and French investors by issuing 60,000 tokens at CHF 100 each, registered as uncertificated securities under art. 973d of the Code of Obligations and carrying economic rights comparable to preferred shares along with a limited governance right. The France-Switzerland investor base requires coordination between the French PSAN regime and FINMA guidelines.

The quote comes to CHF 68,000, at the high end of the CHF 35,000 to 80,000 standard range, due to the dual class of rights, economic and governance, and the France-Switzerland regulatory coordination. The engagement runs ten weeks and covers valuing the company using the discounted cash flow method and sector comparables, allocating value across the 60,000 tokens issued using an option-pricing approach for the governance right, and the methodological summary for both regulatory files.

A word from our founder

"Securities tokenisation changes nothing about one fundamental requirement: an economic right promised to an investor must be backed by a defensible value, whatever the medium, paper certificate or distributed ledger."

"We see too many issuance projects where the valuation arrives after the smart contract is drafted, when it should instead frame the very design of the token classes. That's as true in Paris as it is in Geneva."

"Our role is to stay independent from any tokenisation platform and from any intermediary earning a commission on the raise, so that the value opinion remains defensible before investors as well as the regulator."

Aristide Ruot, Ph.D.
Founder | CEO, Hectelion SA

FAQ: the 10 essential questions about the price of securities tokenisation

Introduction: what to remember before the questions

The price of a pre-issuance valuation depends first on the number of token classes to be valued and the regulatory framework chosen, before the size of the raise itself. The following questions answer those most frequently asked by issuers and their advisors in France and Switzerland.

Q1: How much does securities tokenisation cost?

Between EUR/CHF 15,000 and 70,000 for most SMEs and mid-caps, depending on the number of token classes, the regulatory framework chosen and the legal complexity of the deal, with multi-jurisdiction files exceeding this ceiling (Hectelion's 2026 practice).

Q2: Does the price include regulatory and platform fees?

No. The range shown covers the pre-issuance valuation of the underlying securities and the value allocation across token classes. Tokenisation platform fees, legal structuring fees, and regulatory fees, PSAN registration, AMF visa, FINMA notice, remain separate and billed independently by the relevant providers.

Q3: Who pays for the pre-issuance valuation?

The token issuer, who records this expense in the overall budget of the fundraising transaction, alongside legal fees and platform fees.

Q4: Can the price of a pre-issuance valuation be negotiated?

The scope is more negotiable than the hourly or flat rate itself: reducing the number of token classes or choosing a simpler regulatory framework lowers the budget in a defensible way, unlike a plain commercial discount on an unchanged perimeter.

Q5: Is a pre-issuance valuation mandatory to tokenise securities?

The law does not always impose it literally, but it becomes effectively indispensable as soon as the token confers an economic right communicated to investors, or the issuer risks having the valuation challenged by the regulator or by token holders.

Q6: What is the difference between a pre-issuance valuation and a smart contract audit?

A smart contract audit checks the security and technical compliance of the code. A pre-issuance valuation addresses the economic value of the rights represented by the token and their allocation across classes: the two exercises are complementary and rarely delivered by the same provider.

Q7: Does the budget differ between France and Switzerland?

The ranges stay close, with the French entry point generally slightly below its Swiss equivalent at an identical perimeter, while Switzerland can involve an additional budget line when the issuance opts for registered uncertificated-security status under art. 973d of the Code of Obligations.

Q8: Is an online valuation enough before issuing security tokens?

An online simulator gives a useful order of magnitude upfront, but does not replace a defensible pre-issuance valuation report before investors and a regulator, which requires a documented methodology and a value allocation by token class.

Q9: What happens if the valuation is challenged after issuance?

A properly documented pre-issuance valuation report, with an explicit methodology and traceable assumptions, is the issuer's best defense against a challenge from token holders or a regulator's request, which justifies the initial investment in an independent firm.

Q10: How much does a securities tokenisation cost at Hectelion?

At Hectelion, a pre-issuance valuation for an SME most often falls between EUR/CHF 15,000 and 70,000 depending on the number of token classes and the regulatory framework chosen, on a quote issued after a free initial diagnostic of the issuance project.

Estimate your company's value with Acontos, Hectelion's online simulator

To take this further with a concrete figure, Hectelion offers Acontos, its online audit, due diligence and business valuation tool. Powered by Anthropic's Claude Sonnet 5 artificial intelligence and calibrated on Hectelion's methodology, it reads your accounts, normalizes EBITDA, applies real sector multiples and reconstructs a net debt bridge to estimate the value of your shares within minutes, before that value is allocated across token classes in a formal engagement. Launch the valuation simulator free of charge: the tool is confidential, retains no document and does not replace a formal pre-issuance valuation, but it gives a reliable first order of magnitude before discussing it with our team.

Conclusion: the price of a tokenisation is read in the token classes, not the amount raised

The budget for a pre-issuance valuation does not follow mechanically from the amount of the planned raise. It depends on the number of rights classes represented by the tokens, the regulatory framework chosen between PSAN, AMF visa, the European DLT Pilot Regime or Swiss registered uncertificated securities, and the quality of the underlying asset's financial data at the time of the initial diagnostic. An issuer who involves its valuer from the design of the token classes, rather than after the smart contract is drafted, reduces both its budget and its risk of later challenge.

The 2026 ranges presented in this article, from EUR/CHF 15,000 to over 70,000 depending on the perimeter, offer a benchmark for scoping a negotiation with a provider, whether a Big Four firm, an independent boutique firm, or a technical tokenisation platform paired with a third-party valuer.

Article summary

A pre-issuance valuation before tokenising securities costs between EUR/CHF 15,000 and 70,000 for most SMEs and mid-caps in France and Switzerland in 2026, with multi-jurisdiction or multi-token-class files exceeding this ceiling. The number of rights classes, the regulatory framework chosen, PSAN, AMF visa, the DLT Pilot Regime or Swiss registered uncertificated securities, and the quality of available financial data are the main drivers of price variation, more so than the amount of the planned raise.

The engagement is most often billed on a flat-fee basis, on a perimeter fixed by an engagement letter, and runs three to sixteen weeks depending on its complexity. Involving the valuer from the design of the token classes, rather than after the smart contract is drafted, remains the main lever for controlling the budget without sacrificing the file's defensibility before investors and the regulator.

Hectelion supports French and Swiss issuers with dual France-Switzerland expertise and total economic independence from tokenisation platforms and intermediaries earning a commission on the raise, on engagements of 2 to 500 million (CHF or EUR).