Stop. Think. Act
三思而后行
The secret of a French bank's success
一家法国银行成功的秘诀
Oct 21st 2010 | PARIS
BAUDOUIN PROT has an unusual habit for a chief executive. A talkative man, the boss of BNP Paribas occasionally forces himself to pause before answering a question. The delay can be unnervingly long. He grimaces. He leans back. He scribbles notes to himself, as if wrestling with the finer points of semiotics. As you wait you wonder how many bad ideas have fizzled out in these self-enforced moments of reflection. Perhaps Mr Prot's pauses are one of the secrets of BNP Paribas's success.
作为一位首席执行官，普罗特（Baudouin Prot）有一个独特的习惯。这位健谈的，也是巴黎银行的老板，偶尔会强迫自己在回答问题之前先停顿一下。这一停顿的间隙可能无比的长。他会皱起眉头，身体向后靠。他会为自己草草写上一些东西，就像是在和符号语言学中的亮点作着斗争一般。当你在等待之时，你会怀疑在这些自我强迫的反应时间里有多少的馊主意都化为了泡影。或许，普罗特的停顿习惯正是巴黎银行获得成功的其中一个原因。
In 1999, when BNP bought Paribas after an epic takeover battle, it crowned itself a European champion even though about 60% of its activity was in France. Today the title is deserved. The bank is Europe's third-largest by market value and, measured by its borrowing costs, one of the very safest. Less than 40% of its business is now in France. Like Spain's Santander and Italy's UniCredit it runs retail operations across the continent (a position boosted by the purchase of bits of Fortis, a failed Belgian bank, in 2009). Unlike them it is also big in asset management, private banking and investment banking.
1999年，当巴黎国家银行（BNP：Banque Nationle de Paris）在一次史诗般的收购战中买下了巴黎巴银行（Paribas）后，它加冕自己为欧洲之冠，尽管当时他自己的业务有60%都在法国国内。今天，这样的称号已实至名归。从现在的市值来看，巴黎银行已经是欧洲第三大银行，并且就借贷成本而言它也处在最安全的银行之列。现在它在法国国内的业务也不到所有业务的40%。巴黎银行的零售银行业务已横跨整个欧洲大陆，比如其在西班牙的桑坦德银行（Santander）以及意大利的联合信贷（UniCredit）的相关业务（这样的地位是在2009年收购了一家破产的比利时银行-------富通银行的部分资产后获得的）。和那些银行不同，在资产管理，私人银行和投资银行业，巴黎银行也有着举足轻重的地位。
Success partly reflects what the bank didn't do. Although acquisitive, it avoided big deals before the crash. It owns a subscale retail operation in America but did not go on a subprime bender. It specialises in derivatives yet avoided losing billions on credit-default swaps. Mr Prot's explanation for these dodged bullets is not his habit of reflection, or luck, but "professional management". He keeps a reassuringly tatty list of the telephone numbers of the top 100 managers in his wallet. The bank is mainly run by a tight-knit group of veterans from the original takeover. The executive suite looks like the set of a costume drama but the top brass still gather there and banter―the nearest you can get to a water-cooler moment in a building in which Napoleon Bonaparte got married.
成功也部分反映出巴黎银行的有所不为。即使也是贪得无厌，它在危机到来之前也避免了大手笔的交易。巴黎银行在美国有一个下属的零售银行网点，但是它并没有深陷于次贷业务之中。巴黎银行在金融衍生品上也很在行，但是它也避免了在信用违约掉期上高达数几十亿的损失。普罗特对这些"闪躲行为"的解释是这并不是它的反应习惯或是运气之类的东西，这是一种"专业管理"。在普罗特的钱包里，有一个有些破旧，能让他感到心里踏实的电话号码单，这个名单上的人是排名高居前100位的经理们。银行的运营主要还是依靠一个精炼紧凑的队伍，而这个队伍里的人都是来自原收购公司的经验丰富的"老兵"。管理层人员的办公室就像是时装秀的舞台一般，但是高层们还是会一起聚集在那里谈笑风生-----而这个地方也是这幢大楼里离一个"重大"时刻最近的地方-----拿破仑-波拿巴（Napoleon Bonaparte）结婚的地方。
The most important thing these managers did not do was allow the firm to be dominated by its investment bank. Commercial and investment banking contributed almost half of the combined firm's gross profits in 1999. Today its contribution is about a third. Like Santander, HSBC and JPMorgan Chase, BNP Paribas has a cadre of executives under instructions not to go native when they are posted to its divisions. "I don't believe in an autonomous commercial and investment bank separate from the firm," says Alain Papiasse, who runs the unit and until 2009 led the bank's asset-management and insurance arm.
这些经理所不能做的最重要的一件事就是让这家公司被其投资银行部所统治。在1999年，商业银行业务和投资银行业务的利润总共占到了整个银行总利润的几乎一半。而现在这两个业务的利润总和差不多占到了总利润的三分之一。像桑坦德银行，汇丰银行（HSBC）和摩根大通一样，巴黎银行也有一个核心领导班子，这个班子被指示当他们被派往银行分部就任时不要就这样入乡随俗了。Alain Papiasse说，"我不相信一个具有自主权的商业银行和投资银行会从这个公司分离出去"，而Alain Papiasse目前正负责这一块部门的运营，在2009年前，他领导着巴黎银行的资产管理部门和保险部门。
That may help explain why the investment bank was restrained. Although it flirted with danger (a 2007 presentation boasts of its expertise in exotic credit derivatives), it took little "market risk"―by, for example, holding securities. That also means it will be hit relatively lightly by the new Basel 3 capital rules.
这或许可以帮助来解释为什么投资银行会受到限制。尽管它总是和危险打交道（在2007年的一次宣讲中，它吹嘘着其在奇异信用衍生品上的专长），它通过诸如持有股票的方式使其所需要承担的"市场风险"几乎没有。这也意味着它受到巴塞尔3协议的冲击相对较小。
BNP Paribas has bought quite a few retail banks since 1999. Mr Prot says that keeping the firm evenly balanced was not an explicit strategy but was in the back of managers' minds. When the investment bank grew really fast, between 2003 and 2007, BNP Paribas bought BNL in Italy for � billion ($10.8 billion). It overpaid but the integration of BNL is regarded internally as a success. That confidence helped BNP Paribas to pick up bits of Fortis in 2009 at an attractive price, bringing a big retail presence in Belgium and Luxembourg. It also bulked up its asset-management and private-banking arms, run by Jacques d'Estais (who used to head the investment bank).
自1999年以来，巴黎银行只收购了很少的零售银行。普罗特说保持银行的均匀平衡不是一个明确的策略，而是经理们大脑中的一种潜意识。当其投资银行在2003年到2007年成长非常迅速的一段时期，巴黎银行以90亿欧元（108亿美元）收购了意大利国民劳动银行（BNL：Banca Nazionale del Lavoro SpA）。虽然支付价格偏高，但是从主观上看兼并意大利国民劳动银行也是一种成功。这种信心也帮助巴黎银行在2009年以诱人的价格收购了富通银行的一部分，从而使得其零售银行业在比利时和卢森堡粉墨登场。巴黎银行也壮大了由Jacques d'Estais（曾负责领导投资银行部）负责运营的资产管理部和私人银行部。
How BNP grows now is a bit of a concern. Three-quarters of revenue come from rich economies in continental Europe (although Mr Prot reckons these banking markets may grow faster than over-indebted America, Britain or Spain). The bank has a decent presence in Turkey and north Africa but now that lending without raising deposits is frowned upon, the expansion there will be more branch-based than before―which takes time. Derivatives, the investment bank's old rocket-fuel, which supplied 70% of its revenue growth between 2003 and 2006, are maturing, partly because of more regulation.
巴黎银行是如何发展的，这一问题已受到了一些关注。其总收入的四分之三都来自欧洲大陆的富裕经济体（尽管普罗特称这些国家的银行业市场可能相比于过度负债的国家，比如美国，英国或者西班牙能发展得更快）。巴黎银行原本在土耳其和北非地区还承受着尚可的压力，但是现在无存款抵押的贷款也让他们感到头疼了，而对此情况的解释是银行在那边的分支将比以前更多了，所以还需要时间（来调整）。作为投资银行最原始的动力，在2003年到2006年期间为投资银行贡献了占其总收入增长的70%的衍生品业务，也变得日益成熟了，这其中一部分原因也是因为有了更多的监管。
One priority is to squeeze more from the enlarged group. Mr d'Estais says he can cross-sell more savings products in the bank's newer branches. In Italy there has been a "huge difference made, like night and day," since the acquisition in 2006. At the corporate and investment bank Mr Papiasse jokes that he could "have 200 mathematicians calculate a precise answer", but reckons 5-10% of client revenues are from cross-selling with the rest of the group and that this could double. Having jumped up the European league tables in fixed income, the investment bank is now expanding in equities and in Asia. The firm overall is keen to sell more services to its big base of corporate customers, for example in cash management and trade finance.
现在首要任务是从逐渐扩大的集团中去获得更多的利润。d'Estais说他可以在银行新的分支机构间进行储蓄产品的跨售。自2006年的兼并以来（指兼并BNL），在意大利还有一种"截然不同的操作模式，（和普通操作模式的区别）就像深夜和白天一样"。Papiasse开玩笑说他可以"用200个数学家来算出一个精确结果"，但是他提到有5%到10%的客户收入来自于集团其他分支的跨售而且这一数字还会翻倍。在固定收益方面巴黎银行已经站上了欧洲之巅，其投资银行现在也在证券和亚洲进行扩张。整个巴黎银行上下都迫不及待地向它的庞大的公司顾客群出售更多的服务项目，比如在现金管理和贸易融资方面。
All this might seem a little pedestrian for one of the winners of the crisis. Mr Prot, chief executive since 2003, will probably become chairman in a couple of years, replacing Michel Pébereau. These two veterans could yet unbottle the animal spirits that won Paribas a decade ago. There is the odd hint of hubris―the bank suffers from an inflated view of its capital and funding position, which is reasonable rather than outstanding.
对其中一位（金融）危机中的赢家而言，所有的这一切看起来都有一些平淡无奇。自2003以来一直担任首席执行官的普罗特，在几年之内可能会接替米歇尔-皮贝鲁（Michel Pébereau）成为银行的主席。这两位经验丰富的人能够重新释放活力，这种活力曾使得他们在十年前成功征服巴黎巴银行（Paribas）。而对于这种狂妄已有了奇特的征兆----银行饱受着外界对其资本和基金地位的有些夸大的看法，但是这样的地位看起来是理所当然的，而不是很突出的。
Yet the overall impression is of discipline. BNP Paribas was recently outbid by Santander for a Polish bank. When Mr Prot warns of the dangers of a "market psychology of complete risk aversion," he sounds concerned, not gung-ho. BNP Paribas's recent history is not about being brilliantly contrarian―expanding in downturns and retrenching in booms. Instead it is a story of consistent, tightly managed expansion and risk-taking. Tempered by the ability to stop, and for a moment, think.
但对巴黎银行的整个印象还是中规中矩的。最近巴黎银行在竞标一家波兰银行中败给了桑坦德银行。当普罗特对"完全风险规避的市场心理"的危险提出警告之时，他听起来是很忧虑的，而不是雄风壮志的。巴黎银行最近的历史并不是关于其出色的逆向投资----即在萧条时扩张而在繁荣中紧缩。与之相反，巴黎银行是始终如一般稳定的代名词，在扩张和风险承担方面管理很严。而这样的稳定也是被它的（遇事）能够停下来，想一会儿（再做）的能力所锻炼出来的。
三思而后行
The secret of a French bank's success
一家法国银行成功的秘诀
Oct 21st 2010 | PARIS
BAUDOUIN PROT has an unusual habit for a chief executive. A talkative man, the boss of BNP Paribas occasionally forces himself to pause before answering a question. The delay can be unnervingly long. He grimaces. He leans back. He scribbles notes to himself, as if wrestling with the finer points of semiotics. As you wait you wonder how many bad ideas have fizzled out in these self-enforced moments of reflection. Perhaps Mr Prot's pauses are one of the secrets of BNP Paribas's success.
作为一位首席执行官，普罗特（Baudouin Prot）有一个独特的习惯。这位健谈的，也是巴黎银行的老板，偶尔会强迫自己在回答问题之前先停顿一下。这一停顿的间隙可能无比的长。他会皱起眉头，身体向后靠。他会为自己草草写上一些东西，就像是在和符号语言学中的亮点作着斗争一般。当你在等待之时，你会怀疑在这些自我强迫的反应时间里有多少的馊主意都化为了泡影。或许，普罗特的停顿习惯正是巴黎银行获得成功的其中一个原因。
In 1999, when BNP bought Paribas after an epic takeover battle, it crowned itself a European champion even though about 60% of its activity was in France. Today the title is deserved. The bank is Europe's third-largest by market value and, measured by its borrowing costs, one of the very safest. Less than 40% of its business is now in France. Like Spain's Santander and Italy's UniCredit it runs retail operations across the continent (a position boosted by the purchase of bits of Fortis, a failed Belgian bank, in 2009). Unlike them it is also big in asset management, private banking and investment banking.
1999年，当巴黎国家银行（BNP：Banque Nationle de Paris）在一次史诗般的收购战中买下了巴黎巴银行（Paribas）后，它加冕自己为欧洲之冠，尽管当时他自己的业务有60%都在法国国内。今天，这样的称号已实至名归。从现在的市值来看，巴黎银行已经是欧洲第三大银行，并且就借贷成本而言它也处在最安全的银行之列。现在它在法国国内的业务也不到所有业务的40%。巴黎银行的零售银行业务已横跨整个欧洲大陆，比如其在西班牙的桑坦德银行（Santander）以及意大利的联合信贷（UniCredit）的相关业务（这样的地位是在2009年收购了一家破产的比利时银行-------富通银行的部分资产后获得的）。和那些银行不同，在资产管理，私人银行和投资银行业，巴黎银行也有着举足轻重的地位。
Success partly reflects what the bank didn't do. Although acquisitive, it avoided big deals before the crash. It owns a subscale retail operation in America but did not go on a subprime bender. It specialises in derivatives yet avoided losing billions on credit-default swaps. Mr Prot's explanation for these dodged bullets is not his habit of reflection, or luck, but "professional management". He keeps a reassuringly tatty list of the telephone numbers of the top 100 managers in his wallet. The bank is mainly run by a tight-knit group of veterans from the original takeover. The executive suite looks like the set of a costume drama but the top brass still gather there and banter―the nearest you can get to a water-cooler moment in a building in which Napoleon Bonaparte got married.
成功也部分反映出巴黎银行的有所不为。即使也是贪得无厌，它在危机到来之前也避免了大手笔的交易。巴黎银行在美国有一个下属的零售银行网点，但是它并没有深陷于次贷业务之中。巴黎银行在金融衍生品上也很在行，但是它也避免了在信用违约掉期上高达数几十亿的损失。普罗特对这些"闪躲行为"的解释是这并不是它的反应习惯或是运气之类的东西，这是一种"专业管理"。在普罗特的钱包里，有一个有些破旧，能让他感到心里踏实的电话号码单，这个名单上的人是排名高居前100位的经理们。银行的运营主要还是依靠一个精炼紧凑的队伍，而这个队伍里的人都是来自原收购公司的经验丰富的"老兵"。管理层人员的办公室就像是时装秀的舞台一般，但是高层们还是会一起聚集在那里谈笑风生-----而这个地方也是这幢大楼里离一个"重大"时刻最近的地方-----拿破仑-波拿巴（Napoleon Bonaparte）结婚的地方。
The most important thing these managers did not do was allow the firm to be dominated by its investment bank. Commercial and investment banking contributed almost half of the combined firm's gross profits in 1999. Today its contribution is about a third. Like Santander, HSBC and JPMorgan Chase, BNP Paribas has a cadre of executives under instructions not to go native when they are posted to its divisions. "I don't believe in an autonomous commercial and investment bank separate from the firm," says Alain Papiasse, who runs the unit and until 2009 led the bank's asset-management and insurance arm.
这些经理所不能做的最重要的一件事就是让这家公司被其投资银行部所统治。在1999年，商业银行业务和投资银行业务的利润总共占到了整个银行总利润的几乎一半。而现在这两个业务的利润总和差不多占到了总利润的三分之一。像桑坦德银行，汇丰银行（HSBC）和摩根大通一样，巴黎银行也有一个核心领导班子，这个班子被指示当他们被派往银行分部就任时不要就这样入乡随俗了。Alain Papiasse说，"我不相信一个具有自主权的商业银行和投资银行会从这个公司分离出去"，而Alain Papiasse目前正负责这一块部门的运营，在2009年前，他领导着巴黎银行的资产管理部门和保险部门。
That may help explain why the investment bank was restrained. Although it flirted with danger (a 2007 presentation boasts of its expertise in exotic credit derivatives), it took little "market risk"―by, for example, holding securities. That also means it will be hit relatively lightly by the new Basel 3 capital rules.
这或许可以帮助来解释为什么投资银行会受到限制。尽管它总是和危险打交道（在2007年的一次宣讲中，它吹嘘着其在奇异信用衍生品上的专长），它通过诸如持有股票的方式使其所需要承担的"市场风险"几乎没有。这也意味着它受到巴塞尔3协议的冲击相对较小。
BNP Paribas has bought quite a few retail banks since 1999. Mr Prot says that keeping the firm evenly balanced was not an explicit strategy but was in the back of managers' minds. When the investment bank grew really fast, between 2003 and 2007, BNP Paribas bought BNL in Italy for � billion ($10.8 billion). It overpaid but the integration of BNL is regarded internally as a success. That confidence helped BNP Paribas to pick up bits of Fortis in 2009 at an attractive price, bringing a big retail presence in Belgium and Luxembourg. It also bulked up its asset-management and private-banking arms, run by Jacques d'Estais (who used to head the investment bank).
自1999年以来，巴黎银行只收购了很少的零售银行。普罗特说保持银行的均匀平衡不是一个明确的策略，而是经理们大脑中的一种潜意识。当其投资银行在2003年到2007年成长非常迅速的一段时期，巴黎银行以90亿欧元（108亿美元）收购了意大利国民劳动银行（BNL：Banca Nazionale del Lavoro SpA）。虽然支付价格偏高，但是从主观上看兼并意大利国民劳动银行也是一种成功。这种信心也帮助巴黎银行在2009年以诱人的价格收购了富通银行的一部分，从而使得其零售银行业在比利时和卢森堡粉墨登场。巴黎银行也壮大了由Jacques d'Estais（曾负责领导投资银行部）负责运营的资产管理部和私人银行部。
How BNP grows now is a bit of a concern. Three-quarters of revenue come from rich economies in continental Europe (although Mr Prot reckons these banking markets may grow faster than over-indebted America, Britain or Spain). The bank has a decent presence in Turkey and north Africa but now that lending without raising deposits is frowned upon, the expansion there will be more branch-based than before―which takes time. Derivatives, the investment bank's old rocket-fuel, which supplied 70% of its revenue growth between 2003 and 2006, are maturing, partly because of more regulation.
巴黎银行是如何发展的，这一问题已受到了一些关注。其总收入的四分之三都来自欧洲大陆的富裕经济体（尽管普罗特称这些国家的银行业市场可能相比于过度负债的国家，比如美国，英国或者西班牙能发展得更快）。巴黎银行原本在土耳其和北非地区还承受着尚可的压力，但是现在无存款抵押的贷款也让他们感到头疼了，而对此情况的解释是银行在那边的分支将比以前更多了，所以还需要时间（来调整）。作为投资银行最原始的动力，在2003年到2006年期间为投资银行贡献了占其总收入增长的70%的衍生品业务，也变得日益成熟了，这其中一部分原因也是因为有了更多的监管。
One priority is to squeeze more from the enlarged group. Mr d'Estais says he can cross-sell more savings products in the bank's newer branches. In Italy there has been a "huge difference made, like night and day," since the acquisition in 2006. At the corporate and investment bank Mr Papiasse jokes that he could "have 200 mathematicians calculate a precise answer", but reckons 5-10% of client revenues are from cross-selling with the rest of the group and that this could double. Having jumped up the European league tables in fixed income, the investment bank is now expanding in equities and in Asia. The firm overall is keen to sell more services to its big base of corporate customers, for example in cash management and trade finance.
现在首要任务是从逐渐扩大的集团中去获得更多的利润。d'Estais说他可以在银行新的分支机构间进行储蓄产品的跨售。自2006年的兼并以来（指兼并BNL），在意大利还有一种"截然不同的操作模式，（和普通操作模式的区别）就像深夜和白天一样"。Papiasse开玩笑说他可以"用200个数学家来算出一个精确结果"，但是他提到有5%到10%的客户收入来自于集团其他分支的跨售而且这一数字还会翻倍。在固定收益方面巴黎银行已经站上了欧洲之巅，其投资银行现在也在证券和亚洲进行扩张。整个巴黎银行上下都迫不及待地向它的庞大的公司顾客群出售更多的服务项目，比如在现金管理和贸易融资方面。
All this might seem a little pedestrian for one of the winners of the crisis. Mr Prot, chief executive since 2003, will probably become chairman in a couple of years, replacing Michel Pébereau. These two veterans could yet unbottle the animal spirits that won Paribas a decade ago. There is the odd hint of hubris―the bank suffers from an inflated view of its capital and funding position, which is reasonable rather than outstanding.
对其中一位（金融）危机中的赢家而言，所有的这一切看起来都有一些平淡无奇。自2003以来一直担任首席执行官的普罗特，在几年之内可能会接替米歇尔-皮贝鲁（Michel Pébereau）成为银行的主席。这两位经验丰富的人能够重新释放活力，这种活力曾使得他们在十年前成功征服巴黎巴银行（Paribas）。而对于这种狂妄已有了奇特的征兆----银行饱受着外界对其资本和基金地位的有些夸大的看法，但是这样的地位看起来是理所当然的，而不是很突出的。
Yet the overall impression is of discipline. BNP Paribas was recently outbid by Santander for a Polish bank. When Mr Prot warns of the dangers of a "market psychology of complete risk aversion," he sounds concerned, not gung-ho. BNP Paribas's recent history is not about being brilliantly contrarian―expanding in downturns and retrenching in booms. Instead it is a story of consistent, tightly managed expansion and risk-taking. Tempered by the ability to stop, and for a moment, think.
但对巴黎银行的整个印象还是中规中矩的。最近巴黎银行在竞标一家波兰银行中败给了桑坦德银行。当普罗特对"完全风险规避的市场心理"的危险提出警告之时，他听起来是很忧虑的，而不是雄风壮志的。巴黎银行最近的历史并不是关于其出色的逆向投资----即在萧条时扩张而在繁荣中紧缩。与之相反，巴黎银行是始终如一般稳定的代名词，在扩张和风险承担方面管理很严。而这样的稳定也是被它的（遇事）能够停下来，想一会儿（再做）的能力所锻炼出来的。
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