BNP Paribas’ Allorent to retire; Janbon and Gerardin promoted

BNP Paribas has restructured its senior management following the retirement of Bernard Allorent, global head of risks, and Philippe Blavier, head of corporate and investment banking.

Bernard Allorent, bowing out

Michel Konczaty, head of structured finance, will replace Allorent as global head of risks, while Jacques d’Estais, head of fixed income, will head corporate and investment banking.

Eric Raynaud, head of coverage and territories Europe, will succeed Konczaty as head of structured finance and also run portfolio management at the French bank. Meanwhile, Frederic Janbon, global head of fixed-income trading and a board member at the International Swaps and Derivatives Association, will succeed d’Estais as head of fixed income.

As part of the management restructuring, Yann Gerardin, head of equities and derivatives, will also co-head commodities with Dominique Remy, head of energy, export and project finance, who previously ran commodities and will now take responsibility for asset financing. Gerardin’s equities team has worked closely with the commodities division this year to create a number of hybrid structured products. Meanwhile, Thierry Varène, head of corporate finance and European coverage, will now also take on global responsibility for financial institutions.

Frederic Janbon,
expanded role

Allorent, who replaced Gilles Roman to run global risk management five years ago, is credited with deploying the advanced models used to measure economic capital from the legacy fixed-income derivatives business at Paribas as the chassis for BNP Paribas’ market risk management. He also worked hard to develop better data, notably European credit data, at the bank (Risk October 2001).

Baudouin Prot, BNP Paribas group chief executive, credited Allorent with modernising the bank’s risk management and said he had decreased BNP Paribas’ levels of risk to their lowest rate in the bank’s history. He expressed confidence in Konczaty being able to keep BNP Paribas’ risk management in line with the highest global standards as required by the new prudential environment for banking and financial services.

Prot added that d’Estais and the new senior management at the corporate and investment bank are now tasked with accelerating the bank’s growth in finance, advisory and capital markets.