France remains a vibrant market for investors.

In response to the bid by General Electric to acquire the energy division of Alstom, the French Government issued Decree no. 2014-479 on May 14, 2014.

Stephen Walters, corporate partner and Victoria Régis, Counsel at Jeantet, examine the application of the FDI screening regime to primary equity investments ...

France has reformed its foreign direct investment regime, broadening the scope of the 10% voting-rights threshold to capture French entities listed on nearly all regulated markets worldwide. The changes, effective August 17, 2026, extend FDI notification requirements to include major third-country exchanges through EU equivalence decisions and six specifically named markets, significantly expanding the reach of French investment screening for non-European investors.

The European Commission recently issued COVID-19-related guidance (see Jones Day Alert, March 2020), ahead of the entry into force of the new EU FDI screening mechanism in October 2020. Several member states have been tightening ...

The Guidelines provide foreign investors with welcome clarification on the highly technical French FDI regulations—which are often perceived to be deliberately vague in order...

Le gouvernement français a adopté un décret publié le 1er janvier 2020 concernant le contrôle des investissements étrangers.

Effective January 1, 2022, and with the addition of sectors in which foreign investments are subject to prior authorization by the Minister of the Economy, France has taken another step in its ongoing expansion of foreign investment control.

France, who in recent years has been relatively open to overseas investors, has extended its control over foreign investment into certain ‘sensitive' industries

In a practical guide produced in partnership with LexisNexis, one of the leading online providers of legal information on merger control and foreign direct investment ("FDI") control regimes...

The 2024 annual report on foreign investment control in France (IEF), published by the French Treasury (Direction générale du Trésor) in July 2025, confirms the steady strengthening of France's screening mechanism.

These new provisions mostly implement the recent PACTE law and the new EU FDI regulation which set up an EU screening mechanism.

The 7th Choose France Summit, held on May 13, 2024, brought together nearly 200 foreign business leaders of 40 different nationalities.

On 13 November 2020, the French National Assembly adopted an amendment (the "Amendment" or the "Proposed Measure") which, if approved by the Senate and passed into...

Under French Law, while the principle that "financial relations with foreign countries are free" prevails, this freedom is tempered, in a limited number of industrial or services sectors...

On June 17, 2020, in response to calls from the European Council and certain Member States, the European Commission published a White Paper setting out its proposals for a comprehensive set...

The PACTE law will increase the administration's powers to control and to sanction foreign investments in France.

The Decree notably aims to expand the scope of sectors subject to prior foreign investment control and to clarify and simplify the authorization procedure.

On July 23, 2020, the Government published a Decree no. 2020-892 (the "Decree") and a Ministerial Order (the "Ministerial Order") both of July 22, 2020 on the temporary lowering of the threshold triggering control of foreign investments in French listed companies.

On 9 September 2022, the Foreign Direct Investment Office of the Ministry of Economy (the FDI Office) issued guidelines on foreign investment control.