Chapter 1077: First, we'll take down the Rothschild family

Paris is the capital of France and the country's political, economic, cultural, and commercial centre. Paris is divided into twenty districts, and without a doubt the most prosperous is the old city centre in the northwestern part of the city – the 8th arrondissement.

The Champs-Élysées, which stretches from the famous Place de la Concorde to the Arc de Triomphe, is here, as is the Élysée Palace, the official residence of the French President.

This has been the centre of France since ancient times, and Xia Yu's destination and future home.

Before he arrived, George Berkeley had already ordered a four-storey luxury villa with a floor area of 380 square metres to be built in the 8th arrondissement for Xia Yu, at a cost of 6 million francs.

In addition, Xia Yu also arranged for security personnel to move in advance and check for any possible dangerous factors to ensure his safety in France.

Accompanying Xia Yu to his residence was Léo Martin, the head of the French branch of the Guangming Foundation. A 45-year-old Frenchman with more than 20 years of financial experience, he was the capable and clean-background person that Xia Yu had instructed George Berkeley to recruit in France.

Luo Wang also conducted a comprehensive verification of the growth experience and background of Léo Martin, and found no problems.

Therefore, on the way here, Xia Yu revealed his identity to Léo Martin, and Léo Martin became more and more respectful towards Xia Yu.

'Boss, here is the information you requested!'

After sitting down in Xia Yu's home, Léo Martin asked one of Xia Yu's bodyguards to help open the suitcase, and he pointed to the information piled high in the kraft paper bags inside, and said to Xia Yu:

French is different from English in that it distinguishes between the formal and informal forms of address. In French, the formal form is vous, while the informal form is tu.

Leo Martin was, of course, addressing Xia Yu formally.

Xia Yu glanced at the pile of documents in the box and felt a little overwhelmed.

However, he could imagine that Leo Martin must have gone to great lengths to collect all this information, so he smiled and praised him for his good work.

'Leo, you've done a solid job.'

'Give me the information on the financial industry and banking first, and I'll read the rest later.'

After Xia Yu gave the order, Leo Martin immediately took out a kraft paper bag from the box and handed it to Xia Yu with both hands.

After Xia Yu took it, he opened it and quickly browsed through it.

Although he had a lot of knowledge and memories of France in this era in his mind, except for major events, other detailed information was very vague or even absent.

In order to lay a better foundation for his career in France and achieve his set goals, he needs to gain a comprehensive understanding of the current situation in France to avoid making strategic decision mistakes.

The French banking system is highly concentrated and not as decentralised and diverse as the old Germany next door.

Because of its high concentration, French banks are clearly at the top of the world, but not as good as those in other countries.

For example, this year's Banker magazine ranked the world's banks, and France has four of the top ten banks in the world: the world's number one Crédit Agricole, the world's fourth BNP Paribas, the world's sixth Crédit Lyonnais and the world's seventh Société Générale.

Of these four banks, the world's number one Crédit Agricole is a semi-official bank, and the other three are state-owned banks with the government holding more than 90% of the shares. None of them are private.

But what about the other six banks in the world's top ten?

Two are from the United States, two are from West Germany, one each from the United Kingdom and the island countries, and all six are owned by private consortia.

The difference is obvious!

And then there is the entire French banking industry.

According to current registered information, there are a total of 377 banks in France, including 138 banks controlled by foreign countries, and there are actually 239 French banks.

Among the French banks, there are currently 39 state-owned banks. However, if these banks and state-owned financial companies or enterprises are included, the number of banks controlled directly or indirectly by the state reaches 124, accounting for more than half of the total number of French banks!

This proportion is truly terrifying!

Xia Yu knew very well that the François Mitterrand government was also preparing to further nationalise the banking sector and strengthen the state's ability to intervene in the economy.

He remembered clearly that after the previous reform of the nationalisation of the French banking industry, the business windows of state-owned banks would account for more than 90% of the country, and the share of total social deposits controlled would also be around 90%, while the share of loans to the whole society would also reach about 80%.

Now there are still major national banks such as Crédit Agricole Suez, Crédit Industriel et Commercial and Crédit Commercial de France that are controlled by major consortia and family alliances, and these are definitely François Mitterrand's targets.

From the documents, Xia Yu also learned the reason why François Mitterrand's government intended to reform the banking sector by nationalisation, mainly for the benefit of French state-owned enterprises.

Hit by the economic crisis, the self-owned funds of French enterprises continued to decline, from 66.7% in 1978 to 48% in 1982. The self-owned funds of large state-owned enterprises were even more lacking, falling to 36.7%, and the enterprises were heavily in debt.

In François Mitterrand's plan, he wanted state-owned enterprises to play the role of 'locomotive' in terms of investment in production. Therefore, a large amount of funds were needed to support the implementation of investment policies.

In order to reduce costs and better promote reform, the government should of course mobilise the funds of the whole society as much as possible.

The nationalisation of the banking sector was a major trend led by the François Mitterrand government, and no one could stop it until it caused substantial social harm.

However, the general trend cannot be changed, but minor trends can definitely be intervened in artificially!

Xia Yu was prepared to use these minor trends to achieve his own goals!

There is more than just this information on the banking industry, including information on the shareholdings of many banks. It would take a long time to read it all.

Realising that he would not be able to finish today, Xia Yu gave Leo Martin a few words of encouragement and sent him away.

Over the next few days, Xia Yu did not go anywhere, but stayed at home crunching the numbers.

After he had finished crunching all the numbers, the current situation in France became clear in his mind.

Xia Yu then combined this with his memories from the future, and inspiration after inspiration came to him.

He already knew which areas to start with in order to establish a foothold in France.

But before that, he still had to attend to the most urgent matter!

First, he had to deal with the Rothschilds!

Once he had made his decision, Xia Yu summoned Léo Martin to his home and asked him to deliver an invitation to François Mitterrand.

François Mitterrand was surprised to learn that Xia Yu had arrived in Paris, but readily agreed to a secret meeting with Xia Yu.

One evening, Xia Yu arrived at François Mitterrand's home in a low-key manner...