Borrowing costs for a raft of French companies have fallen below those of their government, as investors’ worries over the country’s political crisis and growing debt pile upend the typical relationship between sovereign and corporate bonds.
Yields on the bonds of groups including L’Oréal, Airbus and Axa have sunk below those on French government debt of similar maturity in recent weeks, according to data compiled by Goldman Sachs, in a sign that investors may see them as a safer bet.
The moves have come as the resignation of Fran?ois Bayrou this week as France’s prime minister, the second such resignation in less than a year, deepened investor concern over French bonds and pushed yields above those of Greece and close to Italy’s.