Moderate Improvement in the French Trade Balance

Apparently, the figures for France's trade balance in recent years follow one another and look similar. Recently, they have improved slightly. Over twelve rolling months, the total French trade deficit reached 59 billion euros in May, which is better than in 2025 (76.5 billion), than in 2024 (84.5 billion) and than in previous years.

France is currently returning to levels close to those of 2017-2019, before the global trade mechanics were turned upside down by the Covid pandemic, then by the war in Ukraine. Even the crisis in the Middle East and its effects on oil and gas prices do not seem, for the moment, to disrupt this return to better fortunes.

The publication this Friday of the half-yearly foreign trade results by Customs does not reveal any major surprises: over the last four quarters, the total deficit increased by only 0.9 billion euros. A fundamental upheaval, however, is…