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Paris - The euro has fallen, oil prices have tumbled and borrowing rates are at record lows: French President Francois Hollande has had much of his economic wish list granted and it may just help him kick-start a long-awaited recovery in 2015.
Granted, the short-term lethargy and structural problems in the eurozone's second-largest economy mean that it will remain a major worry for others in the single currency bloc.
But the global context together with new reforms due to kick in next year are leading some to bet that France can achieve its 1% growth target for next year - modest by many standards but more than twice the 2014 growth estimate of 0.4%.
Crude oil prices have nearly halved since June and the euro, a drop in which has long been sought by French politicians to help exports, has lost 11% since May. At the same time, Paris is borrowing at its cheapest rates ever.
Economic growth
"The chances of the government getting the 1% growth it based its budget on have risen quite substantially," said Peter Jarrett, head of division responsible for France at the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.
"Now it's not an unreasonable number, while a month or six weeks ago I would have said it was optimistic," he said.
Some at the sharp end of the economy agree.
"Three stars are aligned: the weaker euro, cheap oil and low interest rates. This should help kick-start economic activity," said Xavier Beulin, head of France's FNSEA farm lobby.
For Beulin, the maths are simple: poultry farmers make a loss on exports to markets such as the Middle East with a euro at $1.35. But at $1.23, where it is now, they make money.
Agriculture may only be a small part of the economy, but the fall in oil prices also cuts costs for truck and taxi drivers, whose noisy protests have piled pressure on Hollande's government.
Economists at France's INSEE statistics office estimates that a sustained fall of €20 in oil prices could add as much as 0.5 percentage points to growth in the subsequent year if it leads consumers to spend and businesses to invest.
If oil prices remain at early December levels throughout 2015 French industry could expect a €3.4bn windfall compared with 2013, said Denis Ferrand, managing director of economic institute COE-Rexecode.
Competition in the refining sector means the chunk of the drop in crude prices being passed on to industry and consumers has risen to 80% in France in the last year compared with 60% to70% in previous years.
While energy imports are limited by France's nuclear production, firms remain sensitive to oil prices as they use a lot of power: in 2012, France needed 142.9kg of oil equivalent to produce €1 000 of GDP, compared with 129.2kg for Germany and 105.1kg for Britain, Eurostat says.
Low inflation
Excluding energy prices, French core inflation contracted for the first time on record in November and while in the long run this raises deflation fears, some of the country's cash-strapped businesses have started feeling short-term benefits.
A majority of company treasurers cited a positive impact of raw material prices on cash levels last month, a COE-Rexecode survey showed - the first time this has happened since the question was first asked in the monthly survey two years ago.
Separately, low inflation was a contributing factor in a fall in the number of firms going bust in 2014, credit insurer Coface said. While insolvencies remain close to historical highs, a slight fall is also expected this year.
"In the short term, low inflation can bring advantages to the French economy," Coface said.
"It boosts households' spending power and therefore their consumption, which above all is the essential motor for growth," the report added.
Yet many key signals for France are still red - not least unemployment, stubbornly above 10% and which analysts polled say may stay above that level next year.
