Exactly, they do not provide loans, or determine availability of said loans (beyond insulating risk allowing an institution to make more risky investments which as we've seen can be a catastrophic practice).
I would venture that none of these things benefit the 'average' person. Not saying its a bad thing, but the great amount of money dumped into this area of the economy, does not equate to their usefulness to society.
Edit: Actually the next section in the link you provided shows exactly how they can be a great detriment to economic stability including the recent AIG fiasco.
the use of derivatives to conceal credit risk from third parties while protecting derivative counterparties contributed to the financial crisis of 2008 in the United States.
If you're an average person who was going to lose your home, derivatives enabled the bank to give you a loan. Therefore, derivatives have provided value to average people.
However, the 2008 financial crisis showed that when tested, derivatives don't provide much of the value that they were supposed to (shifting risk to those who want it and will quietly suffer the consequences of failure without having spillover effects on the rest of the economy) which essentially retcons away much of that value.
I fully agree. With the exception that the derivatives market allowed them to make a more risky loan to you (IE one you may likely have not been able to pay off and they knew it). I would say the value to society at large is very observable as a negative. Getting a low percentage loan that is unstable or even totally illusory is not value. At least not in my opinion.
I would venture that none of these things benefit the 'average' person. Not saying its a bad thing, but the great amount of money dumped into this area of the economy, does not equate to their usefulness to society.
Edit: Actually the next section in the link you provided shows exactly how they can be a great detriment to economic stability including the recent AIG fiasco.
the use of derivatives to conceal credit risk from third parties while protecting derivative counterparties contributed to the financial crisis of 2008 in the United States.