Why is the investment rate rising sharply (in the euro zone and France) at a time when GDP growth and industrial production are weakening?
The corporate investment rate (in the euro zone and France) rose sharply from 2015 to 2023. Yet there has been no increase in GDP growth or upturn in industrial production. Why? We compare the gross investment rate, the net investment rate (excluding companies’ consumption of fixed capital) and the investment rate excluding software. We see that: The net corporate investment rate is practically stable, explained by the sharp rise in companies' consumption of fixed capital, due to the shorter lifespan of equipment; In France, the software investment rate is very high and rising sharply, which may be due to a difference with other countries in the way software investment is defined . Note that it is not certain that the investment effort has really increased in the euro zone or in France since 2015.