BNP Paribas, the eurozone's second-biggest bank by market capitalisation, posted a surge in third quarter profits on Thursday that beat market forecasts and trumped the results of many rival banks.

Erste Bank said the worst of the crisis may now be over for banks in emerging Europe, after it beat third-quarter earnings forecasts and launched a 1.65 billion euro ($2.4 billion) cash call.

Japan's securities regulator is probing allegations of market manipulation in share trading by BNP Paribas, in what would be another regulatory issue for the French bank following a controversial deal last year with a failed property developer.

Credit Agricole said it would repay $4.5 billion of state support this month, the last of the French banks to detail when it will reimburse government aid given during the financial crisis.

Recently released, the Global Financial Centres Index, which was created by the Z/Yen Group for the city of London, ranks 75 major financial centers in terms of their competitiveness on a global scale. Important factors to gauge a center's competitiveness include people, business environment, infrastructure, market access and general competitiveness, which includes measures such as occupancy costs, tax information and exchange agreements, for a total of 64 instrumental factors.

The global banking industry is a diverse landscape of financial services — consumer, corporate, investment — but with so many players in the marketplace, which are the best in each segment?

JP Morgan changed its preference to traditional, credit-exposed banks from investment banks after regulators pledged to toughen capital rules for financial institutions, Reuters reported Wednesday, quoting research by the bank.

Asia has already emerged more forcefully from recession than the U.S. and Europe and that  upturn  is starting to feed into the job market. Hiring is starting to pick up again, recruiters and bankers say.

After better-than-expected results from Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan Chase this week, Ralph Silva, director at TowerGroup, told CNBC the disparity between them and the rest of the banks in the U.S. has widened so much that there is no longer any competition within the U.S. banking sector.