The election does not guarantee democracyPassersby bulge eye or burst out laughingSwaps specialists role growing in several marketsClearly the refusal must be firmly substantiatedBut it is also known to speak when neededMore a market is liquid most operations are fast and intense exchangesauthorities will act before the ECB but in a long timeRight Courbevoie unanimously denounced the operationWill remain then to finance the infrastructureAt this stage the company's commitment is 0A man who has so many friends, this ends up being a little suspicious. When it refers to the name of François Pérol, consensus is almost wearying. "Sorry", he apologizes to at the outset, faithful to its reputation. A believe that this man has neither enemy nor failure. Even if he is aware that its new functions should emerge a few detractors. Nothing like the balzacien universe of mutual benefit to create the contradiction banks.
Long presented as a man of the shadows, former Secretary General of the Elysee Palace seems to have learned to accommodate the light. Is known about his academic background and impeccable professional, the story of his meeting with Nicolas Sarkozy and their proximity. His talent for Mount of merger-acquisition operations on a large scale, composure and skill in the negotiations, his great capacity for work and his dislike for political intrigue. Over time, those who share also discovered his gifts of imitator and his living good side, his taste for the French a little "has been" song, its large stepfamily. Its way to avoid answering questions by a stroke of humor, his discomfort in introspection. His modesty and reserve, finally. "This is its strength: it is good, and he knows, but is not unbearable so far", summarizes a former collaborator. "He has cleverly built his legend," judge ironically a banker.
Fear nothing
She preceded him in his new group, Banque Populaire - Caisse d Epargne (BPCE). Exhausted by months of bickering picrocholines, the regional barons had little means to oppose his appointment, imposed by the Elysee. What gave him free rein to take radical decisions during the summer, including on the rescue of Natixis without recourse by the State. Now is the hardest: do move mutual culture and modernize the two banks. Create the new number two banking English, no less. But François Pérol has an asset: he is afraid of nothing. He was thus not hesitate to take the head of two groups were asked, to force, if they were at war or merge. In an environment renowned for its Masonic networks, it feels not endangered. He knows that there are shots to take, it is same what amuses him: "He has agreed to take the position precisely because everyone said that it was not made for it and that he was going to crash!", decodes his friend Laurent Vallet, Director General of the Institute of financing of cinema, who has known him at Treasury. Him not, dismounts themselves to believing that it is precisely because the subject was difficult that it appealed to him. "I participated in many negotiations in crisis, or Alstom Executive Life, or even to the Ciri, he explains." This does me not fear at all!
While he had never been in a situation of running a business, there immediately imposed his management style, seduction and bullying with leaders, including those of Caisses d'Epargne, more devious. "From one day to the next day, topics that were left pending for weeks were decided", says one of his relatives. Needed to show that there was a pilot in the aircraft. Surrounding personalities consensus - they, fungible in mutual culture, he chose to personally take on the toughest decisions. "The mode of management is enough latin, or Napoleonic, said a close." He has decide everything very quickly, as he pleases and does not want to clutter of personal opinions. But this is the condition for its success, the mutualist universe is already sufficiently rotten by the ego. ""There is no State of soul, confirms a headhunter. It is detached from what he does.
This apparent detachment is even his trademark. At Bercy, the Elysee Palace or in BPCE, it covers the topics without a priori, hear the parties and never do it annoys. "It is put in a position of weakness," he said. "Is someone of very organized, who knows make decisions by looking at things at the bottom", said Ramon Fernandez, Director of the Treasury, which is near. At worst, it can show a certain irritation. "But he is not seeking compromise, said a banker. They may to be a very different belief from his boss. "As about the rapprochement between Suez and gas of France, initiated under President Chirac and Nicolas Sarkozy operation saw with some scepticism. "If the transaction is made, it is because François Pérol convinced him", continues the banker.
Culture of the action
Pragmatic, the son of a doctor has to little taste for the great debates of ideas. He prefers "to do", as he himself said. To the point that one sometimes wonders if there are convictions. He was Liberal, but without great enthusiasm. "I do not believe in the benefits of the systematic-tick of State intervention, merely there to say." But I'm not sure that my beliefs are great world. "He has taken his membership card to the UMP in 2004, after leaving Bercy to join Rothschild & Cie. And always has. But, by his own admission, it is is "dug" during the presidential campaign of 2007. He has never, even in his youth, participated in a demonstration. "I can't imagine find me in people who are all the same thing."Even at Sciences po, when unions offer students a minute of silence to mark the death of Malik Oussekine, in 1986, he remains seated. He did not denounce the collective phenomenon, but find it difficult to join.
Unlike a Xavier Musca, incarnation of the great clerk of the State, who succeeded him as Deputy Secretary-General of the Elysee, François Pérol seems not dedicated to an ideal. He does not long hesitate to join Nicolas Sarkozy when he was elected, but it is his "energy", "independence of thought" and his "ambition for our country" that seduce. "François Pérol has a culture of action, but that it does not report the moral, said an observer who knows it well." He grows a lateralism form over function. "It is also in penalty cite the name of a personality that would have marked it or inspired. By digging a bit, it evokes Raymond Barre, a Conference which he attended as a young. Or, later, David de Rothschild, who made his profession "remarkably well".Photo of the College of the partners of Rothschild, who was in his Office in the Elysee Palace, did well talk of investment bankers.
Wounded by "the case".
Without a policy, it seems to still have taken taste to power with the attending. After two years in the antechamber of the President, it indeed became a centerpiece of the device élyséen, essential everywhere, acting as the banker of affairs of the Republic. Difficult to cross such a priesthood by remaining perfectly modest and humorous. "He has taste for power and the proximity of power, but its course is not that of an intriguing, said one of his former collaborators." At such a level of responsibility, can no longer entirely be self-deprecating. It must be in the dignity of the Office. "The influence he had gained led him to take a little more seriously than in the usual "The character of Nicolas Sarkozy necessarily eventually weigh on his advisors, note a headhunter. In the end, he spent perhaps less energy to try to convince.
And then there's this spot, which stands in a table so perfect: the case of revolving doors surrounding his departure from the Elysee Palace. "He did had never faced criticism personally, note one of his relatives." But he believes that it may be to make a difference at the expense of the proceedings when there is urgency. That said, it is not less moral or less sensitive than another. "Even today, François Pérol is injured and, once is not custom, may lose legendary calm when it refers to the subject.
