The National Assembly examines a bill aimed at strengthening France’s financial attractiveness

Examination of the text began on Tuesday, April 9 in the evening in a public session at first reading at the Palais Bourbon. The bill aimed at strengthening France’s financial attractiveness will then go to the Senate in mid-May. We owe it to the Renaissance deputy Alexandre Holroyd, deputy for French people established outside France. The text is made up of 14 articles, essentially very technical measures. This bill specifically aims to increase the financing capacities of companies via the financial markets.

This is the most important part of the bill. One of the measures aims to facilitate IPOs to “raise” capital, that is to say allow companies to find money from investors while maintaining control of the situation. Which is not obvious, because the “money providers” generally want increased rights of control over the companies in which they invest. Lock systems exist, they are developed mainly in the United States, France wants to take them as an example.

Post-Brexit situation

Since the Brexit vote in 2016 by the British, many financial operators established in the United Kingdom have come to set up in Paris and are already very present there. After the referendum on the United Kingdom’s exit from Europe, the financial companies that set up in Paris created 7,000 direct and indirect jobs there. Financial firms and investment banks, formerly based in London, today appreciate the regulatory and tax framework offered to them by France, the sixth most attractive country in the world for foreign investors, according to the Kearney firm. Moreover, Paris is the leading European financial center in terms of market capitalization. The Euronext company, whose headquarters is in Paris, today also manages the stock exchanges of Amsterdam, Brussels, Lisbon, Oslo, Dublin and Milan. The French authorities want to consolidate this structure, hence the bill debated in Parliament this spring.