BNP Paribas SA, France’s largest bank, said third-quarter profit fell 72 percent because of a writedown on Greek sovereign debt and losses from selling European
government bonds.
Net income declined to 541 million euros ($741 million) from 1.91 billion euros a year earlier, the Paris-based company said in an e-mailed statement today. That missed the 1.24 billion-euro average estimate of 13 analysts surveyed by Bloomberg. The bank took a 2.26 billion-euro pretax writedown on Greek sovereign debt in the period.