German and French businesses will see borrowing costs tumble by tens of billions of euros over the coming years thanks to aggressive central bank action to lower the cost of funding.

Countries in the credit-starved periphery – the main target of easy monetary policy – will benefit far less from a projected €42bn reduction in debt payments over the next five years, according to an FT analysis of European Central Bank data.

German groups are set to see total interest payments decline by €14bn, assuming all loans are eventually refinanced at the current loan rate of 2 per cent. French companies would pay €9bn less. By contrast, Italian borrowing costs are set to see a fall of just €2.3bn, while Spain and Portugal are likely to see a slight increase.