Paris Trying to Purge Franglais From Finance

The terms les blue chips, les debt equity swaps and la venture capital have all been banned from Paris’ financial houses and trading floors by Finance Ministry decree.

Instead, traders and economists have been instructed to use French equivalents of the terms in an effort to purge the workplace of English-language jargon.

The latest list, published last week, provides French alternatives for such terms as joint ventures, capital risk and cut-off date and awards a black mark to the Franglais verb, swaper, meaning to swap. Blue chips become valeur de premier ordre, debt equity swaps are echange de creances contre actifs and venture capital is capital-risque.

“It’s an effort to protect the French language, but also to try to make the terms more comprehensible for the ordinary person,” said a Finance Ministry spokesman.

Each year since 1985, a Finance Ministry commission has tracked down English terms that have crept into the language, given them a French translation and then published the list.