France is getting ready to use the alleged Romanian salute: "Let me have some money!"

The negative outlook of a potential downgrade of France, which was announced on Monday by Moody"s, seems to be something which the Hexagon has been heading towards, despite any warnings from foreign experts and despite the strong promises of its authorities that its top rating (AAA) would never be brought into questioned.

At the end of May, "Le Figaro" spread the rumor that "France has been working for a few days on a plan that would allow the government to acquire stakes in the country"s financial institutions, if necessary [ed. note: in other words, to nationalize them]", adding that two or three banks were concerned.

"Juste au cas ou" - an expression which gave many people cold shivers ("only if necessary").

In the beginning of July, there were rumors that "La Banque Postale" (the bank owned 100% by the French Post Office, which failed its planned privatization this year) capped, starting at 50%, the weekly amounts which card owners were allowed to withdraw from ATMs - a worrying sign of lack of cash, despite the bank"s high rating (of course, the state"s backing played a major part in its rating).

A little bit later (same month, July 21st), Centrum für Europäische Politik (CEP) placed France in the third group of CEP Solvency Index, on the 11th position, out of the 17 Eurozone member states, immediately below (!) Ireland. The only countries placed below France in that chart were, as follows: 12) Spain; 13) Italy; 14) Malta; 15) Cyprus; 16) Portugal; 17) Greece.

The significance of this position in the chart, bestowed by the authors of the study, comes from the fact that "the country not only spends 100% of its GDP, but also a part of its net borrowed amounts, which threatens its solvency".

In the coming month, in the first decade of August, it as revealed that the French economy - the second largest in Europe, after that of Germany - has stopped its growth, in Q2, and caused concern that it would not be able to honor its plan of lowering its deficit, the plan which was the only reason why rating firms had not already cut its rating.

On that occasion, Goldman Sachs did not limit itself to noting the danger for France, but instead warned that the entire Eurozone was at risk, and said it expected the aggregated economic growth of the region to fall.

In the last third of September, it was rumored that the French bank which Siemens withdrew half a billion Euros from, to deposit them with the European Central Bank, was Societe Generale - another reason to worry, which was telling of the state of the market, where paranoid investors run from one place to the next and from one currency to the next, especially since, a bit earlier, Societe Generale had announced it would cut costs and sell off assets worth four billion Euros, by 2013, in order to bolster its capital and to reassure its investors over the state of its finances.

In mid September, "BNP Paribas" SA, the largest French bank, announced a plan to sell risky assets worth 70 billion Euros, for the same reason: to assuage investor concerns over the bank"s indebtedness and financings, which did not prevent Moody"s from placing it on watch with a view for a potential downgrade, while it effectively downgraded Societe Generale and Credit Agricole, and Chinese banks suspended dealing with all three banks.

October was off to a strong start, with the bankruptcy of French-Belgian bank Dexia ("Dexia is a caricature of the kind of damage wreaked by the race towards ever-greater financial profits by any means necessary", like the members of the union of La Poste described it, opposing the idea, which has now become fact, of having the state owned post office acquire the French division of the bank).

The assets of the Dexia division which is owned by the French, owns bonds of the French cities, which by their quality (or lack thereof), probably attracted the attention of Moody"s, which seemed to think that by placing those bonds on the balance sheet of state owned entities, France has taken on considerable risk, which led to its placement on watch.

Also, at around the same time, Deutsche Bank warned France that by the end of the year, it would be put on negative watch by all the ratings firms. This comes after Credit Suisse had said that 66 European banks would fail the stress tests and need "fresh capital" of hundreds of billions of Euros (the warnings of the two banks seem somewhat inexplicable, because the contagion phenomenon in the banking sector prevents them from avoiding any negative effects, but they don"t seem overly concerned with this little truth).

France seems to be at a crossroads, where it needs to decide whether to participate in rescuing the Eurozone, as a whole, or keeping its money to recapitalize its own banks.

After the G20 summit, held this weekend, the French Finance minister, Francois Baroin, about whom his critics say that he is the head of "one of the most disorganized organizations in the world", he said: "We commit to taking all the necessary measures to maintain the stability of the global systems and of the financial markets".

I can almost see the French, sometime around January, going to the European Central Bank, and greeting it just like they claim the Romanians are doing: "Let me have some money!"