France's benchmark gas prices for households will rise to an average of 129.20 euros ($138.85) per megawatt hour from July, an 11.7% increase from current levels, paper Le Parisien on Monday cited the president of the competent regulator as saying.

"But be careful: this follows a series of successive cuts in recent months, and we are not returning to the same high level as in January," Emmanuelle Wargon, the head of the CRE which sets the benchmark, was cited as saying.

($1 = 0.9305 euros) (Reporting by Tassilo Hummel; Editing by Benoit Van Overstraeten)