PARIS, June 25 (Xinhua) -- France's public debt rose by 75.6 billion euros (85.4 billion U.S. dollars) in the first quarter of 2026 from the previous quarter, reaching about 3.54 trillion euros (4 trillion U.S. dollars), or 117.5 percent of gross domestic product (GDP), the French National Institute of Statistics and Economic Studies (Insee) announced on Thursday.
According to Insee, France's Maastricht public debt, the debt measure used as the European Union reference, increased from 115.7 percent of GDP in the fourth quarter of 2025 to 117.5 percent in the first quarter of 2026.
In the euro zone, the term of "Maastricht's debt" covers all general governments in the sense of national accounts: the state, other government bodies, local governments and social security administrations.
Under the Maastricht treaty, which entered into force on Nov. 1, 1993, for a state to move into the single currency, namely euro, the public finance deficit must be kept below three percent of GDP and public debt must be limited to no more than 60 percent of GDP.
To rein in its growing public debt, the French government has set a target of reducing the public deficit to five percent of GDP in 2026 while keeping public debt at 118.4 percent of GDP. It aims to bring the deficit below the EU's three percent ceiling by 2029, with debt stabilizing at around 118 percent of GDP.
France's public deficit stood at 152.5 billion euros (172.3 billion U.S. dollars) in 2025, equivalent to 5.1 percent of GDP, narrowing from 5.8 percent in 2024 and 5.4 percent in 2023, according to figures previously released by Insee. ■
