Scandalous fraud at Societe General by Tatiana Hadarova

The investigation of Jerome Kerviel's case, He trader who is accused of plucking Societe General of about 4.9 billion euros is now full of contradictions and doubtfulnis. Kerviel has been held by french police since last week and yesterday the investigators extended the detention for another 24 hours. Today they must decide wether to release him or place him under formal investigation. Kerviel still denies any wrongdoing and his words are in contradiction with words of bank's management. Societe General has filled the criminal complaint against Kerviel and said that „he had been using falsified documnets and unathorised computer access to cover up failed deals on share futures and hedges worth tens millions of dollars.“ But on Sunday Kerviel's lawyer Elisabeth Meyer accused He bank of trying to create a „smokescreen“ to hide its wider losses caused by the U.S. suprime mortgage crisis. Of course that Societe General has this allegation denied and bank's chairman and chief executive Daniel Bouton called Kerviel „crook, frauder and terrorist“. That case is also special by the fact, that Kerviel was probably the only one involved in this huge fraud and had managed all the false deals by himself. So far, the investigators have not found any evidences of no other accomplicies involved, either external or internal. They were also trying to establish trtader's motives. Societe general said that there has been taken a quick action to liquidate the concerned deals, limiting losses to 4.9 billion euros. Bank's chairman Daniel Bouton said, that „what happened at Societe General is certainly not a disaster that resulted from out strategy. It is more like an accidental fire which destroys a large factory at an industrial plant.“

related story: http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20080127/bs_afp/francebankingsocietegeneralecrime_15;_ylt=AqsmadIH3xSdwuA7QBjBWpSs0NUE

by Tatiana Hadarova for PocketNews (http://pocketnews.tv)

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