Search results

This book provides a comprehensive outlook on the state and role of consumer credits in the European economy and households. It underlines the role of consumerism and digitalisation, in the framework of legislation. It covers two major turns in consumer credit evolution: the 2008 crisis and Covid pandemic. The first had socio-economic sources, the second one was an external event, but provoked important changes in consumer behaviour. Lockdowns deepened the preference for digital financial products. FinTech and BigData operators acquired broader opportunities with the development of distance services. These new financial services need adapted legislation. The recently published project of Consumer Credits Directive covers new means of communication, such as smartphones, and extends rules to new ways of crediting, like crowdfunding. Consumer credit availability changed the behaviour of households. The propensity of poorer households to save faded due to the ease of getting credit. However, financial insecurity during the Coronavirus pandemic made households limit credits and build precautionary savings.

Abstract
This paper explains the functioning of economic crowdfunding (equity- and loan-based). One of the angles from which crowdfunding can be analysed is institutional economics. Namely, it can be studied as a case where the spontaneous evolution of contractual forms is difficult and the need for legislative intervention arises. The paper explains the divergence of interests and risks of three groups of agents involved (platforms, fundraisers and funders). The radical asymmetry of power, to the advantage of the platform, is inherent in this type of business.
The spontaneous development of strategies by the platforms (pricing and some non-price strategies relating to fundraisers) and recent developments in the direction of automatic decisions taken by the platform instead of funders, promotes the development of the crowdfunding business, but it does not ensure protection from risk of other parties. Still, the major source of risk for funders and partly also for fundraisers is the absence of liability of the platforms themselves. In these conditions, the spontaneous move towards the better alignment of the interests of parties seems unfeasible and external regulation is necessary.

The housing sector in France and Poland
The comparison this article is trying to present is built upon a direct parallel between the housing sectors in France and in Poland. The differences and similarities between the situations encountered in both countries are underlined : the crisis exists in France and in Poland, but this is a different crisis by its deepness and its nature, according to the particularities of the economic system in each of the two countries.
The comparative analysis of the housing situation (age structure, amenity factors and equipment...) and of the evolution of building for the last decade gave an opportunity to show the role of the State in the housing sector. The perspectives of the evolution of the sector, both in France and in Poland, display the importance of the financial conditions for the development of the sector. Even if the financial instruments are different in each of the two countries, their evolution will undoubtedly determine the level of the construction in the forthcoming years.
The article is completed by an annex displaying the differences of the financing, in France and in Poland, based on an example of a young household buying its own appartment.