Five years ago baudouin prot faced a daunting challenge when he took over as CEO of BNP Paribas. Although the French bank thrived in its home market, it was in danger of being overwhelmed globally by the rise of U.S. leviathans: Bank of America Corp. had just acquired FleetBoston to gain the biggest branch network in the U.S., JPMorgan Chase & Co. had bulked up with the purchase of Bank One Corp., and top-ranked Citigroup was so confident of its preeminent global status that it sounded out German politicians about a possible bid for Deutsche Bank. Being the eighth-largest bank in Europe by market capitalization and less than a quarter the size of Citi, as it was at the time, offered few assurances for BNP Paribas's future. But Prot kept his cool, resisting the urge to merge and sticking with a cautious strategy that relied mainly on organic growth. Scale, he told Institutional Investor at the time, was "a faux ami, or false friend....Bankers tend to overrely on it, often to the detriment of focus and customer relations."
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机译：五年前，鲍杜因（Baudouin Prot）接任法国巴黎银行（BNP Paribas）首席执行官时面临严峻挑战。尽管这家法国银行在本国市场上蒸蒸日上，但它却有可能因美国巨额税的上升而在全球范围内不堪重负：美国银行刚收购FleetBoston以获得美国最大的分支机构网络，摩根大通银行（JPMorgan Chase＆Co.）花旗集团（Bank One Corp.）的收购增加了资金，排名最高的花旗集团对其卓越的全球地位充满信心，以至于引起德国政界对可能竞购德意志银行的质疑。按市值计算，它是欧洲第八大银行，不到当时的花旗银行规模的四分之一，几乎无法保证法国巴黎银行的未来。但是普罗特保持冷静，抵制合并的念头，并坚持主要依靠有机增长的谨慎策略。他当时对机构投资者说，规模是“一种虚假的朋友，或者是虚假的朋友……。银行家往往过于依赖规模，这常常会损害客户的关注度和客户关系。”
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