A bit of a stinker for the French this morning on the PMI’s as they post some dreadful figures this morning.

The rest of Europe is sliding from the early years highs but at least they are still in expansion territory (for now). France is back in contraction though and that should be a worry. It’s a familiar story and one I’ve been going on about for over a year now.

The market seems to be ignoring the fact that France is becoming a basket case. It’s missing it’s European budget targets, unemployment is still terrible and the French have made their voices heard by their voting pattern in the European elections.

France have long been my dark horse that would drag Europe down but the market doesn’t seem to care. Joe Weisenthal in BI does a good job of summing the latest data up;

“France has consistently underperformed its fellow “Core” European country Germany throughout the post-crisis period. During the Eurozone crisis, France was always a marginal case, straddling the line between strong core Europe and the PIIGS. Now at least the peripheral countries are rebounding, and yet there’s France, dragging the entire continent own again.

What a mess.”

I get the overriding feeling that there is a lot of heads in the sand over France and Europe is playing the “do nothing and it will work itself out in the end” card. It’s one country that will need to see some very good results from the targeted ECB measures or I fear there’s going to be trouble. Mind you, I’ve been saying that for a while and it’s going to be the new year, at the earliest, before we see any results from the ECB TLTRO’s. More weeks for everyone to ignore France.

So, we shall keep watching this space. Let’s hope someone in France is doing the same.