French bank BNP Paribas has offloaded €11 billion of Italian, Spanish and Irish government bonds and written down 60 percent of the value of its Greek holdings to reduce its €3.5 billion exposure to Greek sovereign debt, Financial Times reports. BNP cut down its holding of Italian sovereign bonds to €12.2 billion from €20.8 billion and sold €2.3 billion of Spanish bonds.

The bank’s total exposure to Spain, Ireland and Portugal is €2.2 billion. The sale has caused a 72 percent plunge in third-quarter profits of €541 million, on revenues that fell 8 percent to €10 billion. The sale of the sovereign bonds cost €812 million, of which €362 million was taken in the third quarter of this year, with the rest to be booked in the fourth quarter.

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