Malversation worth 4.9 billion EUR in Societe Generale bank - bank withdrew from Paris Stock Exchange

One of the largest French banks, Societe Generale, announced this morning (January 24, 2008) that it had lost 7 billion EUR as the consequence of "an exceptional malversation" inside the bank and crisis on the US mortgage loan market.

Extremely big loss is the result of two separate problems. The first one is the crisis on the US market of second-class mortgage loans, which caused the bank to lose 2.05 billion EUR.

The second problem is the malversation performed by one of the employees in the market sector, who was in charge of procurement and sale of stocks, which caused Societe Generale to lose 4.9 billion EUR.

It is assumed that there were some accomplices in the fraud, but that there are no additional information that could close this case.