Growth: Lombard says he is "optimistic" for 2025 without ruling out an adjustment

"On growth, the Bank of France will give its new forecasts in the coming days and we will adapt if necessary. At the beginning of the year, we had some bad news, on employment for example. I remain optimistic," declared Mr. Lombard in an interview published on the website of Le Parisien.

The Banque de France will present its macroeconomic projections on March 12.

In addition to the growth objective, after a 1,1% increase in GDP in 2024, the government intends to reduce the French public deficit to 5,4% of GDP in 2025, compared to around 6% in 2024, at the cost of around 50 billion euros of budgetary effort.

After two consecutive years of public deficit slippage, in 2023 and 2024, Eric Lombard and his colleague Amélie de Montchalin, responsible for Public Accounts, must present an action plan on Monday to improve the management of public finances.

Pointing out on Friday that public finances are "under pressure" and political support for reforms is "limited", the rating agency S&P on Friday left its debt rating unchanged, but gave it a negative outlook. This means that a downgrade is possible.

"The negative outlook means that the recovery of public finances is complicated for France, so we are going to put in place with Amélie de Montchalin the necessary means so that the voted budget is properly executed," assured Eric Lombard.

"We will soon bring together public partners and parliamentarians to keep them informed of its application. If revenue forecasts were to decrease, we would make adjustments in real time to respect the public deficit at 5,4% of GDP for 2025," he added. He ruled out the possibility of a corrective budget.

Regarding the 2026 budget, Eric Lombard recalled that he wanted to "change the contribution of high net worth individuals to combat tax over-optimization", but this will "not be a new ISF at all".

On Tuesday, in line with the work undertaken by previous governments, he will present a simplification plan for businesses, in the area of ​​Cerfa administrative forms or by deploying the SME test, to "evaluate any new regulation or law in businesses, before its implementation", he explained.