BNP Paribas has reached out to other types of clients, too, such as global macro hedge funds. The bank strongly built up its hedge fund business over the past year, going from having almost no hedge fund clients 12 months ago to more than 50 active hedge fund clients in the oil and products space today, according to BNP Paribas. In part, that is because the bank won market share from competitors that suffered from severe liquidity issues last year, hampering their ability to make markets, says BNP Paribas' head of oil trading, Spyros Gkinis. "When the market collapsed, nobody was providing liquidity and on those mornings we were out there providing liquidity," Gkinis says. "At the moment, the market is very dynamic and everybody wants to get into the business. But when difficult times come, clients remember who was there to provide liquidity in every market situation."