Fitch Places France’s ’AA+’ IDR on Rating Watch Negative

London-14 October 2014 : Fitch Ratings has placed France’s ’AA+’ Long-term foreign and local currency Issuer Default Ratings (IDR) on Rating Watch Negative (RWN). The issue ratings on France’s unsecured foreign and local currency bonds have also been placed on RWN. At the same time, Fitch has affirmed the Short-term foreign currency IDR at ’F1+’ and the Country Ceiling at ’AAA’.

Under EU credit rating agency (CRA) regulation, the publication of sovereign reviews is subject to restrictions and must take place according to a published schedule, except where it is necessary for CRAs to deviate from this in order to comply with their legal obligations. Fitch interprets this provision as allowing us to publish a rating review in situations where there is a material change in the creditworthiness of the issuer that we believe makes it inappropriate for us to wait until the next scheduled review date to update the rating or Outlook/Watch status. The next scheduled review date for Fitch’s sovereign rating on France was 12 December 2014, but Fitch believes that developments in France warrant such a deviation from the calendar and our rationale for this is laid out below.

Fitch will seek to resolve the RWN at its next scheduled rating review of France, with the outcome to be published on 12 December 2014.