Are the cause of the contractual obligation and the purpose of the contract the same?

The paper examines the relationship between the cause of the contractual obligation and the purpose of the contract. Namely, an attempt is made to answer the question, whether these are two different legal institutes, or if apart from terminology, there are no other differences between them. The problem is analyzed based on the sponsorship agreement. This contract was chosen due to one of its peculiarities. The economic goal of the sponsor is so obvious and visible, that, without any hesitation, one can think about applying the economic concept of the cause of the contractual obligation to this contract. If we take into account that we have a basis for such a thing in court practice (namely, there are decisions in which the economic concept of the cause of the contractual obligation is applied), as well as the fact that in domestic legal doctrine some authors define the purpose of the contract as an economic goal, the issue becomes obvious.