The accomplice was found through the "soap"

Another suspect has emerged in the Societe Generale case

In the case of Societe Generale bank trader Jerome Kerviel accused of fraud, another suspect has emerged. At the end of last week, French police detained a trader at the Fimat brokerage house, a subsidiary of Societe Generale, which specializes in transactions with derivative instruments. According to law enforcement agencies, an employee of the company, whose name has not been released, knew about Mr. Kerviel’s fraud. Trader Fimat refused to immediately answer questions from the investigation, so the interrogation was postponed to a later date, and he was released. Mr. Kerviel himself, who had been at large until that time, was again arrested at the request of the French prosecutor's office.

The proceedings surrounding the bank, as well as rumors about its possible sale to the BNP Paribas group, do not yet affect the interests of Societe Generale in Russia. Today the French are expected to announce the closing of a deal to purchase a third of Rosbank, as a result of which Societe Generale will gain control of the Russian bank.

French law enforcement authorities identified a new suspect after reviewing Mr. Kerviel's emails. Based on the correspondence between the two traders, police concluded that the Fimat employee knew about Mr. Kerviel's banking transactions. “You have done nothing illegal from the point of view of the law,” the Monde newspaper quotes the letter addressed to Mr. Kerviel.

In court, the Fimat trader refused to answer questions, and therefore it was decided to postpone the interrogation. His lawyer said the charges were based on “pseudo-evidence.” “All the operations that he carried out were authorized, verified, monitored and, I would like to note, encouraged,” the defense lawyer said. The trader is expected to serve as a "complicit witness" in the case - a status in the French justice system that means something between a witness and an accused. Previously, the bank's management claimed that Mr. Kerviel acted alone and that no one at Societe Generale knew about his machinations until mid-January. However, the market claims that transactions for such amounts could not be carried out without assistants. Mr. Kerviel himself claimed during interrogations that management was aware of his actions. He remained at large until Friday. However, Mr Kerviel was arrested again at the end of the week. His release was protested by the Paris prosecutor's office, which filed an appeal. The prosecutor's office motivated its request by the fact that, while at large, Mr. Kerviel can easily communicate with possible accomplices.

As the case of the largest fraud in the financial market, as a result of which Societe Generale suffered losses of 4.9 billion euros, gains momentum, other facts of abuse by traders are becoming known. As is known, Mr. Kerviel motivated his risky play in the financial market with the desire to achieve high bonuses for the year. The opportunity to receive a good annual bonus, several times the size of the annual salary, was taken advantage of by traders from other banks who were also caught exceeding their authority. As reported by Bloomberg, the French bank Credit Agricole suffered a 250 million euro loss last September from unauthorized transactions in its New York division. That same month, regulators fined Swedish bank D. Carnegie & Co. for insufficient control over traders, whose actions led to losses of 630 million crowns ($98 million). In November, the heads of two divisions of HSBC Holdings Bank in Johannesburg were fined for illegal exchange trading in the shares of two local companies, and Canada's Toronto-Dominian Bank suffered a loss of $8.8 million due to the actions of one of the traders in its London office. "What happened at Societe Generale was extraordinary in terms of the size of the loss, but not the nature of the conduct," said Angela Hayes of Lawrence Graham LLP in London. “If there is an opportunity to earn more money, then people will not deny themselves it.”

The losses suffered by Societe Generale, as well as the possible sale of it to BNP Paribas, do not yet affect the current plans of the French banking group in Russia. Today the completion of the transaction for the purchase of a 30% plus two shares of Rosbank should be announced, as a result of which the French will become the owner of a controlling stake in the Russian credit institution. SoGen bought the first 10% of Rosbank shares in June 2006 for $317 million, and in September it acquired another 10%, receiving an option to purchase a 30% stake. The fact that the French want to exercise this option became known at the end of last year.

Natalia ROMANOVA