(Recasts with share price, analysts comments)
By Maya Nikolaeva and Julien Ponthus
PARIS, Oct 28 (Reuters) - BNP Paribas stole amarch on its French rivals in the third quarter, with a bondtrading boom playing to its strengths and helping it offset theimpact of low interest rates on retail banking to beat profitforecasts.
BNP followed U.S. rivals and Britain's Barclays inreporting strong revenue in bond trading.
The French bank's share price has outperformed SocieteGenerale, Credit Agricole and Natixis so far this year, as it turned the page on pasttroubles and focused on a transformation of its investment bank.
BNP Paribas, which said it ranked number 1 in euro bondissuance and number 9 for all international bonds, said it hadseen a pick-up in fixed income, currencies and commodity (FICC)in Europe and the Americas after a lacklustre start to the year.
It also said it had embarked on saving costs in all regionsin its corporate and institutional banking business, as part ofa plan announced earlier this year.
The bank's shares were 1.4 percent lower at 0837 GMT. Itgained 1.1 percent so far this year, while Societe Generale,Credit Agricole or Natixis are all down year-to-date.
BNP, which was fined $8 billion by the United States in 2014for sanctions busting, has escaped major uncertainties since,unlike SocGen which faces a pending sanctions probe in the U.S.and Credit Agricole which is undergoing a major structuraloverhaul this year. Both banks are due to report their resultsover the next two weeks.
Net income at BNP rose 3.3 percent to 1.89 billion euros($2.06 billion), beating the average of analyst estimates of1.72 billion in a Reuters poll.
BNP Paribas also raised its common equity tier 1 ratio (CET1) - a key measure of a lender's ability to absorb losses - by30 basis points in the third quarter to 11.4 percent, as itsought to reassure investors concerned about rising capitalrequirements for banks. (Editing by Andrew Callus and Alexander Smith)
Barclays (BARC)
