Markets will be 'upset' if new French government does not commit to fiscal rules, European Central Bank's vice-president says
French markets will be "upset" if the country's new government does not adhere to the European Central Bank's new fiscal rules, Luis de Guindos, the institution's vice president, said on Tuesday.
De Guindos told CNBC's Annette Weisbach that last month's French bond market moves had not been a cause for concern that would require an ECB intervention.
"What we have seen so far is that the evolution of [French] markets has been quite orderly," he said in an interview at the ECB Forum on Central Banking in Sintra, Portugal.
"We have seen a little bit of widening of spreads, but the situation has been under control in that respect."
The premium on the country's borrowing costs compared to Germany's has recently been trading at its highest level since 2012. France's benchmark 10-year government bond yield has risen above 3.3%, roughly a 12-month high, since the snap election was called by President Emmanuel Macron in the middle of June.
A first-round vote over the weekend was topped by the far-right National Rally party, but analysts said the split suggested a potential hung parliament in the second round on Sunday. This was viewed as a favorable fiscal result by many investors, who are concerned about the tax and spending proposals of both the far right and the far left.
De Guindos's messaging echoed that of ECB Chief Economist Philip Lane two weeks ago, when he said June's French bond sell-off had not been "disorderly."
"I think that this is not about monetary policy, this is about fiscal policy," De Guindos told CNBC on Tuesday.
"The reason why, you know, markets would be upset ... for any government, not only for France, is that fiscal policy does not adapt to the [ECB's] new fiscal framework," he continued.
"So I think that the