Partnering for growth: Olivier Osty on supporting clients in a changing world

In this interview:

• A year of leadership in action – Olivier Osty on how BNP Paribas CIB, the world’s leading European Corporate & Institutional Banking franchise, is driving growth and reinforcing its market position
• Navigating fragmentation with strength – How CIB’s European roots, global reach, and integrated model supports client’s development and prosperity
• The advantage of diversification – Why BNP Paribas’ full-service platform sets it apart in meeting clients’ long-term needs
• Innovation with responsibility – Balancing AI advancements and a culture of trust to create lasting value for clients and stakeholders

At a time of geopolitical uncertainty, rapid technological change and evolving client needs, BNP Paribas CIB is strengthening its integrated model to support clients and the broader economy. Ten months into his role as CEO, Olivier Osty shares his perspective on the franchise’s momentum, its priorities for the next chapter and how CIB can help clients navigate complexity, finance their ambitions and capture long-term growth opportunities.

Olivier, after ten years leading Global Markets, you recently became CEO of BNP Paribas CIB. What are your impressions almost a year in?

Ten months into the role, what stands out most to me is the strength of CIB within the broader BNP Paribas Group. After ten years leading Global Markets, I knew the franchise well, but this role has given me a broader perspective across the platform and reinforced my conviction that CIB has remarkable breadth, strong teams and solid foundations in a rapidly changing environment.

Over the past decade, CIB has doubled its revenues and established itself as the leading European Corporate & Institutional Bank. That trajectory reflects the strength of BNP Paribas’ integrated model, the quality of our people, the investments we have made in our platforms, and our ability to bring expertise together across the bank.

Since September, we have taken that model a step further by making it more integrated and more effective for clients. Today, CIB is organised around two global coverage platforms, Corporate Coverage and Financial Institutions Coverage; five expert businesses, Capital Markets, Equities, Fixed Income, Currencies and Commodities, Securities Services and Transaction Banking; and three regions, Americas, Asia Pacific and EMEA. Their leaders now report directly to me, which drives closer alignment across the bank and a more seamless connection between coverage, expertise and regional proximity.

Your career has spanned markets, technology shifts and international leadership roles. What is one lesson that shapes how you lead CIB today?

Early in my career, relocating to Tokyo taught me a lesson that has stayed with me: some of the most valuable opportunities lie just beyond your comfort zone.

In an environment that is constantly evolving, I believe leaders need to stay open to transformation and ready to embrace innovation, including AI, where it can help us serve clients better and make better decisions. Leadership in a global business is also about building trust across borders, because strong collaboration is what allows us to connect clients with opportunities across markets and unlock the full strength of our platform.

And through all of that, the fundamentals remain the same: focus, informed risk-taking and staying close to clients with a long-term perspective.

Looking ahead, how do you see CIB’s role evolving in an increasingly interconnected yet fragmented world?

The core of our strategy remains highly relevant in today’s environment. Our ambition is clear: to remain the leading European Corporate & Institutional Bank and the go-to partner for clients investing into and out of Europe. In a world that is becoming both more interconnected and more fragmented, our role is to help clients navigate complexity with confidence and seize opportunities with the right long-term perspective.
Our integrated model is one of the main ways we help clients navigate this environment. By connecting financing, advisory, markets and securities services, we can deliver seamless, end-to-end solutions and help bridge growing corporate financing needs, particularly for digital transformation and the energy transition, with long-term investor capital.

We will also continue playing a leading role in transition finance, helping clients decarbonise, strengthen resilience and adapt their business models while preserving performance in a more volatile environment.

What are the main challenges your clients are facing today, and how is CIB helping them respond?

Clients are facing a difficult balancing act. They need to keep investing, whether in growth, digital transformation or the energy transition, while operating in an environment that is more volatile, more selective and often harder to read. At the same time, they are under pressure to protect performance, strengthen resilience and adapt quickly to regulatory and technological change.

Our role is to help them move forward with clarity by bringing together the right financing, risk management, advice and market access in a way that is relevant to each client’s situation.

AI and digital transformation are reshaping banking. How is CIB using these technologies to create value while maintaining trust and security?

AI has been a strategic priority for CIB for many years. We are already well advanced in both traditional AI and generative AI, and these technologies are not new to our organisation. Our employees have had access to AI-powered tools for some time, and we have progressively embedded them across our activities where they create tangible value. The appointment of a Chief AI Officer, Charles Holive, reporting directly to me is therefore not about starting from scratch; it is about accelerating, scaling and structuring the next phase of our transformation.

For us, AI is not simply a productivity tool. It is a strategic lever to enhance the way we serve clients, improve efficiency across our operations, accelerate innovation and strengthen the resilience and competitiveness of our franchise. Our ambition is to deploy it with discipline, security and robust governance. Partnerships, including with Mistral, are an important part of this approach. They give us access to advanced and secure capabilities, while helping us build solutions that are aligned with the needs, responsibilities and standards of a leading European CIB.

The next frontier is agentic AI, and this is a major shift for our industry. It moves us beyond tools that assist people towards systems that can help orchestrate more complex tasks, enhance expertise, accelerate execution and open new forms of client value. We need to approach this transformation with ambition, but also with the discipline expected from a leading CIB: strong human oversight, robust controls, clear accountability and a relentless focus on business value.

In a fast-changing market, what kind of culture does CIB need to continue serving clients at the highest level?

For me, the real cultural question for CIB is simple: can we truly operate as one franchise in an environment that is becoming more complex, more fast-moving and more demanding every year? Because that is where the difference is made. Our clients do not need isolated expertise; they need a bank that can connect coverage, product, regions and execution around the right solution, at the right time.

That requires a culture of clarity, accountability and reliability, with high standards for how decisions are made and upheld. When that culture is in place, collaboration becomes a real source of performance for clients and strength for CIB.

As Olivier Osty reflects on his first ten months as CEO, one message comes through clearly: CIB’s next chapter will be built around its ability to act as one integrated platform, stay close to clients and deploy innovation responsibly in support of long-term growth for clients and the economy.