page_title: Comptoir national d'escompte de Paris
section_title: Executives
hierarchical_section_title: Comptoir national d'escompte de Paris / Executives
caption_attribution_description: English: Mobilization of august 1914 place de l'Opera in Paris. Français&#160;: La mobilisation d'août 1914 place de l'Opéra à Paris. Le Comptoir National d'Escompte de Paris visible sur le mur est maintenant devenu BNP-Paribas
context_page_description: The Comptoir national d'escompte de Paris, formerly the Comptoir d'escompte de Paris was one of four banks that combined to form BNP Paribas.
  The CNEP was created by decree on 10 March 1848 by the Provisional Government of the French Second Republic.
  It was founded in response to the financial shock caused by the revolution of February 1848.
  The upheaval destroyed the old credit system, which was already struggling to provide sufficient capital to meet the demands of the railway boom and the resulting growth of industry.
  The CEP grew steadily in France and overseas, although in 1889 there was a crisis in which it was temporarily placed in receivership.
  In 1945 the CNEP was nationalized, and in 1966 merged with BNCI to form the Banque Nationale de Paris, which in turn was merged with Paribas in 2000 to form BNP Paribas.
context_section_description: In the early years of the bank the executives often had little formal education, but by the time of the Belle Époque (the period of peace and growing prosperity in Europe between 1890 and 1914) secondary education had become more common.
  Applicants to become the bank inspectors, who formed an elite corps from which future banking leaders were drawn, were expected to be qualified in law, economics or business. 
  From 1901 they were subject to an entrance examination.
  Increasingly the senior executives had university degrees, often in law, with talented men from poor families able to rise to the highest levels.
  In addition to academic qualifications, future leaders were valued for their "character", intelligence, organization, adaptability and judgement of risks.
  Alexis Rostand, head of the important branch at Marseille from 1876, became a director of the firm during the reconstruction of 1889, director-general from 1902 to 1908 and president from 1908 to 1919.  His assistant and successor Paul Boyer also worked his way up from the bottom, running an agency for a while, then becoming a director, director-general from 1915 to 1926 and president from 1919 to 1939.
  He was succeeded as director-general in 1926 by Alexandre Celier, formerly a director of the Treasury. This tendency to recruit from government inspectors of finance continued with Henry Bizot in 1930, later to be president, and Charles Farnier, a Treasury director and then assistant governor of the Bank of France who became administrator / director general in 1935.
caption: Mobilization in August 1914, place de l'Opera in Paris, bank in background
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