WFY’26: France’s factoring market reaches €439.4bn as international volumes rise 5%

France’s factoring market recorded a third consecutive year of growth in 2025, with total receivables transferred to factors rising 1.9% to €439.4bn. In this country report, Solenne Lepage, Board member of EU Federation and Director General of the French Association of Finance Companies (ASF), examines one of the world’s largest factoring markets, its distinctive regulatory structure and the pressures shaping the sector as digitalisation and new prudential rules gather pace. France_AW2 France_AW2

The article included in the World Factoring Yearbook 2026 (WFY’26) explores a market where international factoring grew faster than domestic business during 2025, while factoring remains one of France’s two principal sources of short-term corporate funding alongside bank overdrafts. It also considers SME adoption, refinancing constraints, e-invoicing reform and the regulatory treatment of receivables finance.

Below is an excerpt from her article.

Receivables transferred to factoring companies in 2025 reached a total amount of EUR 439.4bn, representing an increase of +1.9 per cent compared to 2024. Of this total, EUR 270.3bn came from domestic transactions (same amount as 2024), while EUR 169.1bn came from international factoring (+5 per cent compared to 2024).

In terms of factoring volumes, since 2018 the French factoring market has been the second largest in the world, after China, and the French market remains in first place in the world in terms of international factoring.

In France, factoring, together with bank overdrafts, is one of the two main sources of short-term corporate funding. Factoring penetration of French GDP stood at 14.7 per cent in 2025, down from 14.8 per cent the year before.

Some 30,500 companies avail themselves of factoring, including an increasing number of large corporates.

There is room to develop factoring activity in the SME sector in France. In order to increase factoring penetration amongst SMEs, factors have developed products specifically adapted to microbusinesses and produced an educational ‘factoring glossary’ for the managers of microbusinesses which simplifies and standardises factoring operations terminologies. France_AW2

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To read the whole article and 50 other specialist articles and country market reviews, order World Factoring Yearbook 2026 here.