We are a pan-European bank and 70% of our balance sheet is in Europe. We expect gross domestic product in Europe to grow by 1% on average, and we expect any negative impact to be more than offset by the investments that Europe intends to make. The continent has confirmed that it wants to invest more in infrastructure, digital, defence and energy transformation – as can be seen for example in the German investment plan. With this and our strong European customer base in mind, we do not see the uncertain environment having a significant impact on our outlook.

We are a bank that is able to cross-sell and we are uniquely positioned in Europe with our full range of services for retail, corporate and institutional clients. We can therefore grow faster than European GDP. We expect our revenues to grow by 4%. Thanks to our rigorous cost management, we are maintaining a positive cost-price gap, which means that we expect growth of 7% at the bottom line. Earnings per share will grow by 8% thanks to our buyback programme. That is our horizon for this and next year.

The punitive tariffs could slow down some business to some extent. Some companies are taking more time to make their decisions. It's by no means the case that they don't want to invest anymore, but they are asking themselves where they should invest. This is leading to delays in some areas, but also to an upturn in others. We believe that overall this is levelling out. In Europe, we are seeing that investment is continuing, but there are differences in the individual countries.

BNP Paribas benefits from a long presence in the US and a strong Corporate & Institutional Banking division, which we continue to strengthen. Our integrated and diversified business model allows us to sell a variety of products and meet the different needs of clients. In the US, we had one bank, Bank of the West, but not the full range of products, so we were unable to utilise our model and cross-sell. That's why we withdrew from the retail business with the sale in the USA.

As far as Corporate & Investment Banking is concerned, we have the products, so we are active in the USA. The markets – fixed income, equities – are much more developed in the USA than in Europe. The European capital markets are not deep enough to finance large European corporations. In addition, the US remains a core market for our clients, so we have to be there. On the other hand, we also support US clients who want to develop their activities in Europe.

One of the biggest challenges facing the European banking sector at the moment is regulation, especially regulatory harmonisation. There are positive signs that we may find a common basis for regulations. For example, Europe has decided to postpone the application of the Fundamental Review of the Trading Book (FRTB). This means that we retain a more level playing field with the US banks, which have also suspended its implementation.

Payments are indeed a strategic issue for Europe, in which we continue to invest. As far as the digital euro is concerned, the use cases of the project are not yet clear. In addition, the costs of the project are very high. And this at a time when Europe needs to invest massively in many areas. In addition, the digital euro could take away funds for financing the economy by immobilising deposits in central bank accounts. As far as we are concerned, we are focussing on the provision of Wero. We have supported this since its inception. In less than a year, more than 40 million Europeans have already registered for it.

In order to achieve a complete capital markets union, there must be strong harmonisation between the countries, for example with regard to insolvency law. Nevertheless, the Savings and Investment Union is a good first step.

Europe is now working on several things, including attracting more capital to equities, and adapting Solvency II so that equities and fixed income are treated more coherently for insurance companies. It would be very good if that could be achieved because then there would be more capital and more instruments available to invest in European companies.

In our view, cross-border consolidation is rather unlikely in the current situation, as many regulations in Europe are still regional. I don't believe that anything will change quickly. The situation is different for national consolidation. There are around 6,600 banks in Europe. Consolidation would therefore make sense in countries where it has not yet been completed.

We are very happy that we can strengthen our position in Germany with these acquisitions. We have also just completed the acquisition of Axa Investment Managers. Our approach has always been to strengthen our existing activities in our group's key markets through targeted acquisitions.

Germany is a key market for which BNP Paribas has high ambitions. We want to build on our existing positions, for example in commercial banking, insurance, CIB and asset management. The economic structure in Germany is solid and we believe that we can continue to gain market share and serve our institutional, corporate and high net worth clients.

This acquisition was a strategic step for the entire group. It makes BNP Paribas one of the European market leaders in asset management – including long-term asset management for insurance companies and pension funds. The transaction has now been finalised and should result in a legal merger of the two entities by the end of the year. Joint working groups have already been set up to develop a roadmap, which will be presented to the relevant employee representative organisations.

BNP Paribas has already committed 24 billion euros to the defence sector in Europe and remains ready to support the future needs of our clients.

Technology is a key element of our strategy. We have more than 800 AI use cases in production across the group to provide new services to our clients, strengthen security and improve operational performance. Our goal is to create 750 million euros in value in 2026 through new revenues, efficiency gains and improved risk management. Of course, all technologies, including AI, will be deployed in a secure environment with strict controls at every stage.

Lars Machenil would never have dreamed that he would one day become the CFO of one of Europe's largest banks. After all, the 56-year-old electrical engineer actually completed a doctorate in nuclear science after his studies. The Belgian gained his first experience in the banking world at the age of 25 during an internship at J.P. Morgan in the USA.

Back then, J.P. Morgan regularly recruited young employees from research centres. The interest shown by the US bank made Machenil realise that, as a nuclear scientist, not only the doors of research and industry were open to him.

He then began his professional career at Procter & Gamble. After two years, he moved to McKinsey. The management consultancy sent him to Fortis Bank as a consultant, which poached him in 2000. The keen skier worked for the finance department of the Belgian bank, which was acquired by BNP Paribas in 2009, in various roles in the Benelux countries, Poland and Turkey before being promoted to Head of Finance in 2009. In 2012, BNP Paribas appointed him Chief Financial Officer for the entire Group.