Overview of France’s Economic Performance<\/p>\n
PARIS, Jan 30 (Reuters) – France’s economy grew modestly in the fourth quarter of 2025, slowing after a strong summer rebound as slightly softer domestic demand and a rundown in business inventories weighed on activity, preliminary data from the INSEE statistics office showed on Friday.<\/p>\n
Quarterly Growth Analysis<\/p>\n
Quarterly growth eased to 0.2% from 0.5% in the third quarter when the euro zone’s second\u2011largest economy surprised on the upside. The fourth\u2011quarter reading matched both INSEE’s forecast and economists’ expectations, according to a Reuters poll.<\/p>\n
Factors Influencing Economic Outlook<\/p>\n
Over the course of 2025, the economy expanded 0.9%, outperforming the 0.7% assumption used in government budget planning. The stronger\u2011than\u2011expected performance increases the chances that the fiscal deficit will come in slightly below the 5.4% of gross domestic product that is currently projected.<\/p>\n
Domestic Demand and Investment<\/p>\n
The economy held up better than many forecasters had anticipated, despite months of political turbulence in a deeply divided parliament that weighed on sentiment among households and companies.<\/p>\n
Impact of Political Climate<\/p>\n
“We’re off to a good start in 2026,” Finance Minister Roland Lescure said on TF1 television. “I hope we’ll get at least the 1% (growth) we’re expecting.”<\/p>\n
Some political uncertainty is expected to ease as Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu prepares to push the 2026 budget through parliament on Friday, ending a protracted standoff over fiscal policy.<\/p>\n
Opposition parties are expected to file no confidence motions against his government, but they are unlikely to pass.<\/p>\n
Prospects for a strong rebound remain limited, economists say. The budget “remains unfavourable to businesses” and higher taxes could curb investment and job creation, ING economist Charlotte de Montpellier said in a note. <\/p>\n
She described the overall outlook as “modestly positive,” citing early signs of improving business confidence, though a strong euro could hinder exports.<\/p>\n
In the fourth quarter, household spending and investment boosted overall domestic demand, which contributed 0.3 percentage points to the growth rate.<\/p>\n
With exports growing and imports falling, foreign trade added 0.9% to the growth rate while a drawdown in corporate inventories subtracted 1%.<\/p>\n
(Reporting by Alessandro Parodi, editing by Inti Landauro and Thomas Derpinghaus)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Overview of France’s Economic Performance PARIS, Jan 30 (Reuters) – France’s economy grew modestly in the fourth quarter…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":730458,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5309],"tags":[217081,15397,31376,2000,299,52704,30328,36,147304,217080,217082],"class_list":["post-730457","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-france","tag-business-inventories","tag-domestic-demand","tag-economic-outlook","tag-eu","tag-europe","tag-fiscal-deficit","tag-foreign-trade","tag-france","tag-household-spending","tag-modest-growth-slowdown","tag-political-turbulence"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115983196155603082","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/730457","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=730457"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/730457\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/730458"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=730457"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=730457"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=730457"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}