...Territorial Reform and New Political Mandate for French Regions From 1 January 2016, the number of regions of Metropolitan France will be reduced to 13 from 22 as 16 regions will merge into seven new entities. Fitch estimates that implementation of the territorial reform will not be completed in 2016, with the co-existence ¡ at least in the first year ¡ of the budgets of merged regions in the new ones. Regions' ratings may be affected by the budgetary profile of the new region. But we estimate that this would not severely affect the capacity of the latter to honour their obligations, notably in terms of debt. Following regional elections held on 6 and 13 December 2015, the centre-right opposition gained seven of the 13 Metropolitan regions (including Ile-de-France), up from one out of 22 in the 2010 elections. The impact of this result will be visible after the 2016 budgets' approval, by 31 May 2016 for the merged regions, 30 April 2016 for the others. The "NOTRe law" of July 2015 strengthened...
