Domestic demand is expected to remain the engine of growth in France, with net exports playing a minor role in the near term. Risks to the outlook are tilted to the downside. Boosting potential growth requires a comprehensive strategy. The consolidation targets set out in France’s Stability...

This 1999 Article IV Consultation highlights that the economic recovery in France—which began hesitantly in the mid-1990s—strengthened in the first half of 1998 when internal demand became the driving force in a setting of price stability, strong competitiveness, and falling interest rates....

Stage 2 of monetary union in the Europe is to involve greater monetary cooperation; the paper examines the case for using the M3 money supply aggregated across “core ERM” countries- -those with low inflation and absence of realignments- -as a vehicle for that cooperation. First, the...

The 2012 Article IV Consultation with France discusses the financial and economic conditions of the country. Although France weathered the 2008 financial and subsequent euro area crises relatively well compared with other advanced countries, its recovery has been sluggish. France has become a...

This Financial System Stability Assessment on France discusses the French financial system and the restructuring of French banks to different business models. The French banking system weathered the 2007–09 global financial crisis well. The large French banks have announced plans to meet Basel...

The paper identifies France’s structural reforms that would yield the largest competitiveness gains based on macro-empirical evidence, and reviews signs of potential gains from a deregulation of the services sector. It is expected that completing deregulation in the services sector would...

The price level behaviors of the CFA franc zone countries with respect to the price level of France, defined in terms of long-run convergence in price level and short-run linear dependence of their inflation rates are not homogenous and have a break-point in the mid 1980s except for Congo. This...

This paper examines the implications of European fiscal harmonization for the French economy using a general equilibrium model. The latter extends the overlapping generations simulation model of Auerbach and Kotlikoff in three ways. A well-developed external sector is included. Households face...

We study empirically daily French and German interest rate changes since the Basle-Nyborg agreement of September 1987. In particular, we ask whether the shock associated with German unification altered the degree of leadership of German monetary policy in the ERM. We conclude that Germany’s...

This paper estimates a simple consumption-smoothing model of the French current account, and examines its capacity to predict recent developments in France’s external performance. The model views the current account as a buffer through which private agents can smooth consumption over time in...