Banque de France, the French central bank, said the 58 billion euro fall in its public-debt holdings over six months came entirely from bonds reaching maturity, and that it had sold none of the paper it bought. The statement answered Eric Coquerel, a deputy for the left-wing La France insoumise party who chairs the National Assembly finance committee, after he questioned a stock of 546 billion euros at the close of 2025 standing at 488 billion euros in June.
Banque de France, the central bank of France, said on 12 September that the six-month shrinkage of 58 billion euros in its public-debt holdings had a single cause: bonds that reached maturity. It had sold none of the paper it bought, the bank said, so the decline followed no decision to sell. A bond that matures leaves a portfolio by itself once the issuer repays the principal, which is why the stock shrinks even when nothing is traded.[1]
The statement was addressed to Eric Coquerel, a deputy for the left-wing La France insoumise party who chairs the finance committee of the French National Assembly. Coquerel had raised a stock of 546 billion euros at the close of 2025 standing at 488 billion euros in June, asking whether securities had been sold on the market in between. The distance between those two dates is the 58 billion euro figure the bank answered for. A central bank letting its public-debt portfolio shrink is a political question because it changes who carries that debt.[1]
Banque de France recalled that the holdings come from the asset purchase programmes the European Central Bank launched in 2014 and in 2020. Under those programmes the euro area's national central banks bought public debt, held it, and for a time replaced what matured. Reinvestment stopped in July 2023 for the first programme and in January 2025 for the second. Every bond that has matured since leaves the portfolio with nothing put in its place, and that is the mechanism by which the stock melts on its own.[1]
