© Joel Saget/AFPFrançois Hollande
Two men have been arrested and charged over the alleged break-in and theft, which took place on Nov 22 but only came to light on Tuesday. Two bodyguards were expected to be on duty.
A source close to Mr Hollande, 71, said he was "shocked" but that police had reacted swiftly to the burglary, limiting the consequences for the former leader and his partner, Julie Gayet, a 53-year-old actress and producer.
Police in Paris confirmed that intruders forced entry into Mr Hollande's home in the capital's eastern 20th arrondissement, when he and Ms Gayet were out.
The two Algerian-born suspects, both in their early 30s, were charged and placed in detention last Friday, the prosecutor's office said.
According to a report in Le Figaro, the burglars allegedly stole a watch and an iPad, insisting afterwards that they believed the property to be an abandoned squat.
The pair reportedly approached the property shortly before 8pm, noticing, by their own account, an open gate and darkened windows. Only once inside did they realise the home was inhabited, with the heating still on.
Six minutes after entering, they left empty-handed. Security cameras showed them departing with "no apparent objects" in their possession. One, however, had forgotten his electronic cigarette and returned half an hour later. It was during this second visit, prosecutors say, that he pocketed the watch and iPad.
These were found four days later in the Paris suburb of Seine-Saint-Denis.
Remarkably, Hollande's protection officers did not detect any of this in real time. Police stationed several hundred yards away from the residence - reportedly to placate neighbours irritated by the visible security presence - were monitoring the property via a computer linked to a surveillance system.
On the night of the burglary, they later told investigators, the feed suffered a "30-minute bug" that prevented them from spotting the intruders.
Mr Seydi Ba, lawyer for one of the suspects, called the explanation "a little thin", arguing that the combination of an open gate and a remote, malfunctioning surveillance post amounted to "a real dysfunction of the protection service".
Both lawyers for the two suspects decried the detention of their clients, who each have a clean criminal record.
They argued that the authorities have resorted to inflated charges of "organised gang theft" purely because the victim is a former president.
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