Does it even matter who wins the French election?

It’s taken a while for the political-media axis to realise just how unpredictable this election has become, and the potentially dire possible consequences, even if Le Pen can be beaten. Were Le Pen and Mélenchon to go through to round two, the crisis would not wait for the result. There’s not yet a full-bore run on French bonds but money is already moving out of France and the notion that London’s banks are about to decamp to Paris now belongs to the realms of fantasy.

Nowhere, perhaps, has there been so much complacency as in the higher echelons of the EU, where it is only now dawning that the French election may render EU summits unworkable and any semblance of a unified negotiating position on Brexit impossible. This could lead to the hardest of British exits, although it might no longer be clear what Britain would be exiting from.

As for France, even if it escapes Le Pen or Mélenchon this time and ends up with Fillon or Macron, it could be another story in 2022 as the country’s intractable malaise pushes it further towards political extremes.