Splint Invest experience: Invest in Rolex & Co. from €50

If you want to diversify your assets and make them less dependent on price movements on the financial markets, alternative investments are an exciting addition to the traditional equity portfolio.

The up-and-coming Swiss platform Splint Invest is taking a pioneering approach: it is democratizing access to high-quality collectibles by making them available to a wide range of investors. Investments in art, luxury watches or rare wines, which were previously almost exclusively reserved for very wealthy individuals, can now be made easily and digitally via an app.

In our Splint Invest experience, we show you how the Splint Invest business model works, where we see the advantages and disadvantages and how you can invest your first Splint in a collector’s item of your choice without any risk to yourself – now also in Swiss francs.

Promo code SFB60 and preliminary remarks on our Splint Invest experience

Splint Invest convinced us, which is why we entered into a cooperation with the Swiss start-up, which was founded in 2021 and is now well established.

This article is primarily based on our own research and experience. We received first-hand support from Splint Invest on individual topics where in-depth background knowledge was helpful.

With the promo code SFB60 you will receive a starting credit of 60 in your reference currency (CHF, EUR or GBP) and can test Splint Invest with a real investment without any financial risk. You will also be supporting our blog.

🎁 Exclusive February special for those who are already convinced (limited time):
If you would like to invest more directly, you will receive a bonus of 150 for an investment of 600 in February. Use the promo code SFBSPECIAL.

Important: The two promo codes cannot be combined. Only one code can be used per registration.

Simply download the app to your smartphone, register, enter the promo code and off you go!

– Partner offer –

Disclaimer: Investing involves risks of loss.

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Alternative Investments

For those of you who are new to alternative investments, we have summarized the most important facts about this/these asset class(es) in this chapter.

What are alternative investments?

As the name suggests, these are alternatives to traditional asset classes such as equities or bonds. Alternative investments are often characterized by the following features:

• Weak correlation with traditional asset classes or even contrary market development
• Low liquidity or long-term capital commitment
• Increased profit and loss potential

Examples of alternative investments established on the market are:

• Hedge funds: actively managed funds with the aim of achieving market-independent returns
• Private equity: Investments in unlisted companies with growth potential
• Commodities: e.g. wheat, oil or precious metals
• Real estate: Investing in “concrete gold”
  (see also our article Real estate ETFs: The easiest way to invest in concrete gold)

Collectibles or luxury items are less well known, but are also alternative investments. This is what this article is about.

Why should you invest in alternative investments at all?

In terms of comprehensive asset diversification, alternative investments can complement traditional asset classes such as equities or bonds well.

Adding alternative investments can make your own portfolio more resistant to stock market turbulence and interest rate fluctuations. This reduces the dependency on conventional investments and the associated market developments and opens up new potential return opportunities.

About Splint Invest

Brief history

Splint Invest is a Swiss start-up based in Zug, which was founded in 2021 by two private investors and auditors, Aurelio Perucca and Mario von Bergen, among others. They were motivated by the realization that many private investors, driven by negative interest rates, stock market turbulence and rising inflation, were desperately looking for alternative investment opportunities.

After a test phase among acquaintances, the app went live in February 2022. By 2026, the platform already had around 20,000 investors – and the trend is rising sharply.

Splint Invest is a so-called financial intermediary. As a member of the self-regulatory organization VQF, Splint Invest is audited annually for compliance with money laundering regulations.

How does Splint Invest work?

Platform & investment idea

Splint Invest is based on an app that you download to your smartphone. You can use this platform to trade digital shares in alternative investments. These are collector’s items or luxury items, also known as collectibles or luxury items in technical jargon.

Specifically, you can invest in contemporary works of art, high-quality luxury watches, exquisite wines, selected whiskey barrels or exclusive handbags, for example, thereby acquiring co-ownership of these objects.

Splint Invest makes collectibles accessible to a wide range of investors. This asset class was previously reserved for very wealthy individuals, as the company’s own slogan “Do it like the top 1%. Invest in alternative investments”.

Interaction between experts, platform and investors

Splint Invest operates the platform, selects external partners and validates their expertise according to data-based criteria. If Splint Invest comes to the conclusion that the external partner is trustworthy and the collector’s item on offer is fairly valued, it is purchased and offered on the platform as an investment object.

What amounts are involved?

From as little as €50 – or the equivalent in CHF or GBP – you can purchase shares, known as splints. With the promo code SFB60 , you even get your first split for free, which is effectively a risk-free investment.

Splint Invest now offers you three reference currencies: EUR (previously), now also CHF and GBP. A single Splint is still equivalent to €50, but is converted into the selected reference currency. You can find out exactly how this works in this article from Splint Invest.

Existing customers can change their reference currency once and irrevocably, for example from euros to Swiss francs. In our experience, the currency change can be initiated with just a few clicks and takes effect within 24 hours.

What fees are charged by Splint Invest?

Let’s start with the positives: There are no custody fees or other hidden costs with Splint Invest. There is also no withdrawal fee when you transfer the proceeds from the sale of Splints back to your bank account.

Splint Invest only incurs transaction-related costs when buying and selling splints.

The purchase price of splints already includes the so-called platform fees and any external management costs. These costs are calculated once over the entire investment horizon and vary depending on the investment object.

When you sell an investment, you will also be charged a flat-rate fee of 2% of the sales price.

To help you decide, we recommend that you find out exactly what fees will be charged before you purchase an investment. You can do this easily and individually according to the planned investment amount via the app.

What are splints?

A splint is a digital unit that defines the co-ownership of a physical asset . A watch with a value of €20,000 is therefore divided into 400 splints of €50 each. If you buy four of them, you own one percent of the watch.

How are splints taxed?

Splints are tangible assets under Swiss law. The value of the splints reported at the end of the year is added to the assets in the tax return. An investment with Splint Invest is therefore subject to wealth tax.

How is the expected return determined?

Together with the external experts, an investment horizon and three scenarios are defined for each property with regard to the expected performance: a defensive, a balanced and an offensive scenario. These forecasts are largely based on historical data or returns and sales prices achieved in the past for comparable properties.

According to our Splint Invest experience, the returns are often over 10% p.a., but vary considerably from property to property. For example, the expected annual return as at January 14, 2026 for the active offers for the balanced scenario ranges from an attractive 13.2% (Saphir Edelstein) to a high 28.8% (Panini card with basketball player Reggie Miller from 2016).

In the next chapter, you will find out what real returns have been achieved through sales to date .

When will they be sold and what real returns have been achieved so far?

The sales process is initiated by Splint Invest on a rule-based basis, i.e. from the start of the defined investment horizon, and is generally based on the balanced or offensive scenario.

According to our Splint Invest experience, however, it is often the case that an offer corresponding to the offensive scenario arises before the specified investment period expires. In this case, Splint Invest arranges for the collector’s item to be sold prematurely. Occasionally it can also happen that the market opportunities for a particular item become less favorable. In such cases, Splint Invest may recommend an early sale – even at a loss – on which all investors will vote.

The ordinary investment term varies depending on the property and is generally between around one and ten years.

Alternatively, you can also initiate the sale yourself via the trading venue. You can find more information on the trading venue below.

 

The 35 sales realized by Splint Invest to date indicate attractive returns and a comparatively short holding period, as the following overview shows.

Key figure	Value
Total exit volume	€ 2.39 million
Total number of exits	35
Average net yield	26%
Average holding period	14 months
Best exit	78,9%
Fastest exit	2 months

If no suitable purchase offer is received within the defined sales range (usually 2 – 3 years), the sales process is continued. In this case, offers that correspond to the defensive scenario are also accepted.

As an alternative to these sales organized by Splint Invest, you can also sell your shares in the investment object yourself. This is because Splint Invest offers a secondary market, the so-called trading marketplace , where splints can be traded within the Splint Invest community on a monthly basis. We will go into more detail about the Splint Invest marketplace later.

Where are the goods stored?

Storage is a factor that should not be underestimated when it comes to the performance of the asset. Splint Invest places correspondingly high quality demands on its partners in this regard. Currently, for example, watches and handbags are stored in the vault of the Berner Kantonalbank in Bern, while whisky barrels and wine bottles are stored in state-supervised bonded warehouses (e.g. in London).

What tangible assets can you invest in?

The range of alternative investment opportunities is constantly being expanded, as are the higher-level categories. The following categories are currently available (sorted by introduction, oldest category first):

• Whisky
• Watches
• Art
• Wine
• Handbags
• Rum
• Diamonds
• Lego
• Miscellaneous (e.g. precious metals, collector’s cards, sneakers)
• Digitized rights
• Luxury cars
• Private equity

As with equity investments, the same applies to this asset class: in order to achieve the best possible risk/return ratio, it is worth diversifying as broadly as possible across several property categories.

How does the registration process work?

The registration process is simple and takes less than a minute: enter your name, e-mail address and a password. A welcome e-mail is generated immediately, which must be confirmed. That’s it!

After registering, you can redeem the promo code SFB60, which will credit you with CHF, EUR or GBP 60, depending on your choice of reference currency. This amount can only be transferred back to your bank account after it has been invested.

Only when you have purchased a total of 10 splints or more, i.e. from an investment amount of €500, is verification of your identity required. You confirm this with a valid ID document and a selfie in the form of a short video sequence. This purely digital process took us around two minutes.

In principle, anyone aged 18 or over who is resident in Europe or has access to the app can register.

How do I transfer money?

Money can be transferred via a bank account (individual or standing orders possible). Thanks to the European SEPA payment area, to which Switzerland also belongs, transfers from your bank to the platform and back are free of charge. Alternatively, you can also transfer money by credit card, but debit cards are not accepted.

Transfers are currently possible in CHF, EUR or GBP, depending on the reference currency selected.

What is the app good for?

Let’s get straight to the point: We have rarely come across such an informative and yet extremely clear app. Compliments Splint Invest!

You can download the app for free from the Google Play Store and Apple App Store. We have tested the latter.

The app is available in German, English and now French. The actual content is divided into the following five sections in the menu bar:

Investments” section and Stefan’s first purchase

This is where the music plays and the voyage of discovery begins! You can make an initial selection using the filter function, including by status (all, active, available soon or sold out), yield or term.

Stefan decides on an object with the highest possible return potential and the shortest possible investment horizon – and finds what he is looking for. He invests his first split in a painting by the artist David Hockney.

The value of this painting from 2010 is estimated at an impressive €156,000, resulting in a total of 3,123 splints. At the time of purchase, 42% of the splints were still left. As Splint Invest reported on request, there have not yet been any slow sellers after around 100 purchases. This means that a purchase is usually completed within a few hours to a few days at most.

And lo and behold: barely invested, the artwork has already increased in value by 0.6%! The increase in value is based on the monthly revaluation of all investments on offer. On 10.7.2025, the painting was sold by Splint Invest after 33 months, which corresponds to a realized net return of 14.3% p.a.

An auto-invest function is not yet available, but is planned.

News” section

The monthly performance updates, including a market outlook, should be of particular interest to investors. The news articles also include interviews with external experts and introductions to individual team members. The published content is characterized by careful preparation and a high information content.

Dashboard” section

This is about the company’s own investments. The cumulative market and nominal values as well as the changes in value are displayed. To assess the diversification of your own portfolio, you can also find out how many categories and investments you are invested in.

Category “Trading center”

Investors can offer their splints for sale on the trading platform. This secondary market is open from Thursday to Sunday. The selling person determines the offer price. However, in order to avoid abuse and unwanted transactions, the offers must be within realistic ranges. These ranges are defined by Splint Invest.

And indeed, the price bands imposed on the selling party are conservatively defined and hardly exceed the market price determined. At the lower end, however, Splint Invest tolerates large discounts. A typical price range for a Splint with a determined market price of € 52 would be € 29 – € 55, for example.

Splint Invest also advises against early, speculative sales. This is because such a strategy is often associated with a loss of returns. Instead, you should only sell via the trading venue when you need liquidity.

Stefan purchased a Splint for €48.50 for the first time via the trading platform on 10.8.2023, for a Rolex Sky-Dweller . This offer was therefore €1.50 below the original price and corresponded approximately to the market value determined by Splint Invest at the time of purchase. Since then, he has regularly bought splints via the trading platform, often when they are offered below market value, for which there is a practical filter.

Profile” section

In addition to personal details, there are also interesting things to discover in this section. Numerous explanatory videos are available in the FAQs. If you still have unanswered questions, you can also formulate your individual question in the chat in this section. We did this several times and always received a satisfactory answer within the promised 24 hours.

A small drawback: Unfortunately, the response is sent by email and there is no way to retrieve the requests in the app, let alone a ticket system where you could track communication with support.

Our conclusion about the app

The app positively surprised us in terms of its functionality, clarity and information content. Whether purchases, transactions via the trading platform, explanatory videos or questions to support: all interactions can be conveniently controlled via the app – without any paperwork.

What are the risks?

The greatest risk of this alternative investment is a financial loss. This occurs if the sales proceeds are less than the amount originally invested. As no long-term track record spanning several market cycles is yet available, statements on possible loss phases can only be made to a limited extent at present. On a positive note, however, numerous sales have already been successfully completed and many collector’s items have found buyers at attractive prices.

It is also important to note that any insolvency of Splint Invest does not represent a cluster risk on the investor side. The underlying luxury items do not fall into the bankruptcy estate, but remain the property of the investor. In addition, all collector’s items offered are insured against theft and damage.

The Smart Club for convinced investors

The Smart Club is an exclusive community that is particularly convinced by Splint Invest. The following four advantages are associated with it:

• Premium access: As a Smart Club member, you can reserve new splints before they become public.
• Cashback bonus: Every year you receive 1% bonus cashback on your invested amounts (net), credited directly as bonus credit in the app. The bonus is credited in January.
• Smart newsletter: You will receive regular updates with insights, expert tips and insider information.
• Invitations to exclusive events: Exclusive events allow you to network with other investors and gain insights from industry experts.

To remain a member of the Smart Club, you should fulfill the following two obligations:

• Annual net investment worth at least EUR 5,000. The net investment amount is the total amount invested across all categories, less sales and exits in the same period.
• Investments in at least 4 categories per year, e.g. in art, watches, wine and handbags.

Admission requires a personal invitation from an existing member. If you are interested, Smart Club member Stefan (stefan@schweizerfinanzblog.ch) will be happy to send you the invitation link.

What are the advantages and disadvantages of Splint Invest?

Conclusion on our Splint Invest experience

Alternative investments such as high-quality collector’s items can help to better diversify a portfolio and make it more stable. We were impressed by this asset class and its user-friendly implementation, which is why we are adding splints – i.e. shares in these collectibles – to our portfolio, which consists primarily of equity ETFs. We are doing this gradually over a longer period of time and without exceeding a 10% share of the total portfolio value.

For a still young platform for alternative investments, the question of trust is central. The same applies to Splint Invest: despite numerous realized sales, a long-term track record over several market cycles is still lacking. However, we consider it positive that many collector’s items have achieved double-digit returns, found buyers quickly and the secondary market has functioned well so far.

In our opinion, splints are particularly suitable for people who wish to supplement their portfolio with alternative investments and who value at least one of the following aspects:

• Better diversification and potentially less dependence on equity and interest rate markets
• higher potential returns, combined with corresponding risks
• more emotion compared to traditional investments such as shares or bonds

Questions? Just write them in the comments below. We’ll get back to you as soon as possible.

– Partner offer –

Disclaimer: Investing involves risks of loss.

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Updates

2026-02-14: February special offer added.

2026-01-15: Article comprehensively updated.

2025-10-03: New accounts with reference currency CHF or GBP explained.

2025-06-23: Smart Club from Splint Invest explained.

2025-04-15: Exit table updated.

2024-11-01: New table with all sales to date and details of the returns achieved added.

2024-04-09: Mention of previous sales, completion of the investment categories, multilingualism of the app and increase of bonus to 60.

2023-09-04: Own experiences with the trading center added.

Disclaimer

Disclaimer: Investing involves risks. You must decide for yourself whether or not you want to take these risks.

Errors excepted: We have written this article about our Splint Invest experience to the best of our knowledge and belief. Our aim is to provide you as a private investor with the most objective and meaningful financial information possible. However, should we have made any errors, forgotten important aspects and/or no longer have up-to-date information, we would be grateful if you could let us know.