2023-10-20 06:18:04
► Don’t put all your eggs in one basket
This motto of stock market investments also applies to solidarity savings. Investments always carry an element of risk, particularly company shares. If you have savings available, it is recommended to mix these investments. You can also take shares or equity securities in a real estate company, but also subscribe to a LDDS (Sustainable and Solidarity Development Booklet, Editor’s note), which is more secure, the outstanding amounts of which are partly used to support social or environmental projects and of which Interest can be shared with associations and NGOs, or in a term account, which is also more secure.
► Dare to be original
Solidarity economy projects are often atypical, but they have long taken into account ecological and social emergency issues. Well before other financiers, for almost forty years, citizen savings have not hesitated to successfully support fair trade, recycling (like Emmaüs), very social housing (like Habitat et Humanisme ), soft mobility, renewable energies (like Enercoop) or organic agriculture. And without these citizen contributions, most of these projects recognized today would not have been able to get off the ground…
► Monitor taxation
There is a set of tax measures, defended by the Fair association, which make it possible to cushion the risk taken by savers. This is the case for all tools that invest in unlisted companies. Provided you keep your securities or shares for five to seven years, and for a ceiling not exceeding €100,000 for a couple (€50,000 for a single person), it is possible to benefit from a 25% reduction. of the subscription amount until the end of 2023. This rule, which has existed for a long time, can be modified in the 2024 finance bill, as in each PLF.
► Stay in control
Saving as a citizen also means keeping control of your money. Building on the one person-one voice principle applied in associations and cooperatives (statuses which several solidarity actors have adopted such as Living Villages or Trois Colonnes), it is entirely possible to be heard during AGMs or to participate in the life of the structure, by becoming an ambassador, for example. As a citizen, you become guarantor of the solidarity investor’s project and its objectives.
► Find out about investments
There are different ways to find out about the destination of your investments. First, find good ideas in the annual La Croix and Fair solidarity finance barometer. Get information from NGOs like Friends of the Earth or Reclaim Finance, who have read the banks’ information notices for you and decipher the money circuits.
Consult the labels, such as the Finansol label, which guarantees the solidarity and transparency of investments, or the ISR label, which verifies the compliance of investments with social and environmental criteria defined by regulations. Finally, download the Rift mobile application, developed by Lita, which takes stock of your investments and will confirm that, yes, your bank account is financing fossil fuels and tax havens…
► Join a collective of citizen savers
If you are not yet comfortable with financial mechanisms and reading accounts, contact groups like Cigales or Clefe, which also play a role in popular education on these sometimes specialized subjects.
They sometimes organize internal training sessions to better appreciate the business projects presented to them. In these clubs, we also find varied skills, brought by each other’s professions. Finally, joining together allows you to share the risks.
► Sign contracts
Investing part of your savings is a big commitment. It is advisable to sign a contribution and exit agreement with the company where you are investing. There are standard contracts, whether for solidarity real estate companies, which must provide them in accordance with AMF (Financial Markets Authority) regulations, or for investor clubs, thanks to which you can benefit from tax reductions.
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