Banque de Paris et des Pays-Bas
The Banque de Paris et des Pays-Bas, generally referred to from 1982 as Paribas, was a French investment bank based in Paris. In May 2000, it merged with the Banque Nationale de Paris to form BNP Paribas.
History
Background
In the early 1820s, Louis-Raphaël Bischoffsheim founded a private banking establishment in Amsterdam in his own name. His brother Jonathan-Raphaël created a branch in Antwerp in 1827 before settling in Brussels in 1836. Having married Henriette Goldschmidt, the daughter of Frankfurt banker Hayum-Salomon Goldschmidt, Louis-Raphaël Bischoffsheim established the Bischoffsheim, Goldschmidt & Cie bank in Paris in 1846, then in London in 1860. In 1863 he merged these banks into the Nederlandsche Credit- en Deposito Bank, which he had founded in Amsterdam: the Bischoffsheim family thereby established a powerful multinational banking conglomerate.Separately in 1869, a group of bankers and investors including Adrien Delahante, Edmond Joubert and Henri Cernuschi, with the private bankers Eugène Goüin, Adolphe-Ernest Fould of the Fould family, E. et A. Schnapper Stern, Brugmann, Tietgen, founded the Banque de Paris, with its headquarters near the Opera at 3 rue d'Antin, Paris.
Creation and initial growth
The two banks, Banque de Crédit et de Dépôt des Pays-Bas and Banque de Paris, merged on January 27, 1872, to form the Banque de Paris et des Pays-Bas.During its first year of existence, the new bank joined forces with Crédit Lyonnais to head the financial consortium set up to float one-third of the Franco-Prussian War indemnity loan of 3 billion francs for the French government. The major part of the funds raised by Banque de Paris et des Pays-Bas came through its Brussels outlet as a result of the close relations established with certain German financiers.
After a few years of collegial governance, the bank was chaired by from 1876 to 1894, then by Goüin from 1895 to his death in 1909. During that period it led or participated in major government loans, and in share or bond issues for French and foreign private companies. Most noteworthy among these were:
- government loans for France, Belgium and their respective colonial empires;
- public loan issues in France or Imperial Russia ;
- issues for the Balkan states, for the Scandinavian countries and for Morocco, with the creation of the Moroccan Debt Administration in 1904;
- issues in the 1880s and 1900s for Latin America.
Developments in the 20th century
The impact of inflation during the 1920s, combined with the reconstruction effort and moves to expand the bank's activities under the guidance of Horace Finaly led to an increase in the banks capital and further investment in industrial concerns and public utilities.
World War II eroded its capital and the bank was cut off from its affiliates and correspondent banking partners in the allied countries. It lost a portion of its foreign assets in Central Europe and Norway. Nevertheless, it helped in the development of industrial patents for such products as alternative fuels, gas producing substances and oil-shale.
Its merchant-banking profile had enabled it to sidestep nationalization in 1945 and Paribas was able to take full advantage of the legislation of 2 December 1945 and 17 May 1946, which ratified the status of a full-service bank. The bank was thus poised to develop its activities freely in commercial banking for French companies and, before long, on an international scale.
The 1960s to 1980 saw Paribas start an investment bank in New York which it expanded into an internal banking network with offices in a number of countries and started an asset management services to private and institutional clients. Claude de Kemoularia was an important executive in the bank during this period. It also directs its activity towards businesses and participates in the development and restructuring of French industry including names such as Bull, CSF, Thomson.
The bank was nationalized in 1982 by the government led by Pierre Mauroy under President François Mitterrand, as part of a wave of nationalization that included five major industrial companies, thirty-nine depository banks, and the two investment banks Indosuez and Paribas. That same year, the bank adopted its longstanding telegraph address "Paribas" for its brand and corporate identity. Paribas was re-privatized in January 1987 by the government led by Jacques Chirac.
In 1998, Paribas acquired the Compagnie Bancaire and subsequently renamed itself Compagnie Financière de Paribas.
In 1999, Banque Nationale de Paris and Société Générale fought a complex battle on the stock market, with Société Générale bidding for Paribas and BNP bidding for Société Générale and counter-bidding for Paribas. BNP's bid for Société Générale failed, but its bid for Paribas succeeded. As a consequence, the merger of BNP and Paribas was completed one year later, on 22 May 2000, forming BNP Paribas.
Leadership
- , Directeur Général 1872-1877
- , Président du Conseil d'Administration 1877-1894
- , Président 1894-1895
- Eugène Goüin, Président 1895-1909
- Léopold Renouard, Président 1909-1910
- , Président 1910-1911
- , Président 1911-1914
- , Président 1915-1930
- Horace Finaly, Directeur Général 1919-1937
- Jules Cambon, Président 1930-1931
- Émile Moreau, Président 1931-1940
- , Directeur Général 1937-1940, then Président-Directeur Général 1940-1945
- , PDG 1945-1949
- , Directeur Général 1948-1966, then PDG 1967-1969
- Emmanuel Monick, PDG 1949-1962
- , PDG 1962-1967
- Claude balivet, Directeur Général 1966-1969
- , Directeur Général 1969-1978, then PDG 1978-1981
- , PDG 1969-1978, then PDG 1981-1982
- , Directeur Général 1978-1999
- , Directeur Général 1978-1999
- , PDG 1982-1986
- , PDG 1986-1990, then Président du conseil de surveillance 1991-1999
- , Président du directoire 1991-1999
Notable buildings
In Paris, the Banque de Paris, upon formation in 1869, purchased the former hôtel Bourgeois de Boigne also known as at 3, rue d'Antin. That historic mansion became the Parisian head office of the BPPB following the merger in 1872. In 1875, the BPPB acquired the adjacent mansion at No. 3 bis, and in the 1950s, the nearby building at No. 5. Following the 2000 merger, the complex hosted the offices of the chairman and CEO of BNP Paribas, even as the group's registered office was at the former BNP headquarters at 12, boulevard des Italiens. In 2023, the executive offices were relocated to the latter property, and BNP Paribas sold the historic complex on rue d'Antin.
The Compagnie Bancaire, acquired by Paribas in 1998, was headquartered in a modern building at 5, avenue Kléber in Paris. That building was remodeled in 2011 to become the head office of SCOR SE, which relocated there in March 2012.