Nicolas Sarkozy, French president, on Thursday turned up the heat on banks with the first of a series of meetings with regional officials and bank chiefs aimed at tracking the amount of credit provided to households and businesses.

The president summoned bank executives and Treasury officials to the Elysée palace to spell out in more detail their obligation to increase the amount of credit in the real economy by 3-4 per cent a year in return for €10.5bn ($13.5bn, £8.3bn) in subordinated loans from the government.