French public debt reaches 3,345.8 billion euros in the first quarter of 2025

France's public debt continues to grow. It reached €3,345.8 billion at the end of the first quarter of 2025, representing 114% of gross domestic product, an increase of €40.5 billion compared to the previous quarter, INSEE announced on Thursday, June 26.

This is a bad sign for a government seeking a budget for 2026 and which finds itself threatened with censure by the left after the failure of pension negotiations between the social partners. The executive, which is seeking to find 40 billion euros in savings , is organizing a new "alert committee" on June 26 during which it will share its diagnosis of the state of public finances in France.

The eurozone's second-largest economy after Germany is also a deficit loser . Its debt, which reached €3,305.3 billion, or 113% of GDP in the fourth quarter of 2024, is the third-largest after Greece and Italy. This enormous sum, fueled by financial, health, and inflationary crises, represented only 57.8% of GDP at the end of 1995, according to the National Institute of Statistics.

In the first quarter of 2025, the State's contribution to the public debt increased by €36.7 billion, following a decrease of €3.7 billion in the previous quarter. The local government deficit also increased by €600 million, but less sharply than in the previous quarter, when it increased by nearly €12 billion.

The same is true for the debt of social security administrations, which increased by €3.3 billion compared to a decrease of €5.5 billion in the previous quarter. In contrast, the debt of various central government bodies is stable, and even decreased slightly by €100 million after increasing by €1.1 billion in the previous quarter.