ABSTRACT
Beliefs about the efficiency of financial markets and the resilience of giant financial firms, such as banks, exerted a powerful influence before they were disrupted by the crash that started in 2007-08. One belief that was influential on the development of consumer finance markets is that dealings between financial firms and retail consumers of financial products are essentially private and mostly local in scope and purpose (Williams, 2013a; FSB, 2011; Piccioto and Haines, 1999). No matter that financial consumption had become a key element of economic policy in many countries or that financial products were supplied by giant transnational corporations through global brands (Tschoegl, 2005, 1987), the idea persisted that consumption of financial products reflected only the self-defined private goals of individual consumers, producers and retail market intermediaries and did not engage broader public or collective interests. This view influenced national and international policymaking throughout the twentieth century with the result that financial consumer protection regulation was constructed as a matter of local preferences about the distribution of contract power between producers and consumers of financial products and regarded as of little significance to global financial regulation.
