More consumer spending in France.

The Bank of France's bulletin for the first quarter of 2005 was released at the beginning of May 2005 and showed that French households had increased their spending in the first quarter 2005 by a "significant" amount. Spending was up 1.2 percent over the previous quarter. In the last quarter of 2004, spending actually decreased 0.2 percent.

The Bank also reported that household spending for manufactured goods increased 1.5 percent in January 2005 after having decreased 0.4 percent in December 2004. When compared with the year ending in January 2004, the year ending in January 2005 showed French households spending 3.8 percent more for manufactured goods. This compares with December's year-on-year increase of 6.8 percent.

French consumers posted other good news as well.

The French national statistics office, INSEE, said that their overall index of household sentiment rose from - 25 in January to - 23 in February. Moreover, all of the components of the index increased. Notable was household sentiment on whether or not it was currently the right time to make purchases. This measure increased two percentage points. When asked by INSEE about the household's past and future financial situation, householders responded with positive answers by an increase of one and two percentage points respectively. A similar question about past and future living standards gained two and three points respectively.

Consumers were upbeat also about employment.

While prices did rise during the period, most of the increases were attributed to fuel costs directly and to goods and services that are affected by increases in oil prices. France's National Index of Consumer Prices was up 0.5 percent in February.