Del credere

House of Lords, 1856, Couturier v Hastie: the agents who had sold for Couturier a cargo of grain, already disposed of en route by the master on the day of sale, owe nothing, since there was no cargo to sell. The case is taught for mistake as to subject matter. Credit people read it differently: Hastie acted as a del credere agent, selling on someone else's behalf and guaranteeing on top of that that the buyer would pay. The word comes from the Italian star del credere, to answer for the credit one has had extended. In French law the commissionnaire ducroire remains a commission agent under article L. 132-1 of the Commercial Code; the del credere clause makes him answerable for the third party's performance, scholars treat it as a suretyship, and he earns for it a del credere commission separate from his selling commission. The German Commercial Code regulates the same clause for commercial agents (section 86b HGB): in writing, limited to specified transactions or customers, with its own remuneration. From trading the word moved into insurance. In Belgium, state backing for export sales goes back to the law of August 7, 1921; the body that carries it was called the Office national du ducroire until it moved to the Credendo brand, and a Brussels practitioner still says ducroire where a London one says credit insurance. The mechanism has hardly moved. The agent guaranteed his own sales, on his own name alone; a credit insurer guarantees thousands of buyers it never found, debtor by debtor, with a limit on each and capital behind them.