The Banque de France's 16.3575 capital key in the European Central Bank

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The Banque de France's 16.3575 capital key in the European Central Bank

Background

France's currency is the euro and it has been a member of the euro area since 1 January 1999. The European Central Bank's page on capital subscription states that the capital of the ECB comes from the national central banks (NCBs) of all EU Member States and amounts to €10,825,007,069.61. The NCBs' shares in this capital are calculated using a key which reflects the respective country's share in the total population and gross domestic product of the EU, and these two determinants have equal weighting. The ECB adjusts the shares every five years and whenever there is a change in the number of NCBs that contribute to the ECB's capital, on the basis of data provided by the European Commission; the latest adjustment took place on 1 January 2024. In the table of euro area NCBs, Banque de France (France) carries a capital key of 16.3575 and paid-up capital of 1,770,700,531.41 euro, the second largest in the euro area behind the Deutsche Bundesbank at 21.7749. The fully paid-up subscriptions of euro area NCBs amount to a total of €8,957,303,649.83.

Currency: euro (€) Euro area membership: member since 1 January 1999 Subscribed capital of the ECB: €10,825,007,069.61 Banque de France capital key (%): 16.3575 Banque de France paid-up capital (euro): 1,770,700,531.41 Total paid-up subscriptions of euro area NCBs: €8,957,303,649.83

Why it matters for exams: Euro area questions turn on who owns the ECB's capital and how each share is worked out; the population-and-GDP formula is asked far more often than any single country's figure.

Kerala PSCUPSCBank

2 October 2026 Source: European Central Bank Updated 10 October 2026

In plain words

Capital key Capital subscription key of the European Central Bank — The share of the ECB's capital allotted to each national central bank, based equally on its country's share of EU population and of EU gross domestic product.

NCB National central bank — The central bank of an individual EU Member State, such as the Banque de France, which holds a share in the capital of the European Central Bank.