is a French retail banking network. It consists of the following banks: * ,

Toulouse Toulouse ( , ; oc, Tolosa ) is the prefecture of the French department of Haute-Garonne and of the larger region of Occitania. The city is on the banks of the River Garonne, from the Mediterranean Sea, from the Atlantic Ocean and from Par ...

Aquitaine Aquitaine ( , , ; oc, Aquitània ; eu, Akitania; Poitevin-Saintongeais: ''Aguiéne''), archaic Guyenne or Guienne ( oc, Guiana), is a historical region of southwestern France and a former administrative region of the country. Since 1 January ...

(oldest existing bank in France, founded in 1760) * ,

Alsace Alsace (, ; ; Low Alemannic German/ gsw-FR, Elsàss ; german: Elsass ; la, Alsatia) is a cultural region and a territorial collectivity in eastern France, on the west bank of the upper Rhine next to Germany and Switzerland. In 2020, it had ...

Lorraine Lorraine , also , , ; Lorrain: ''Louréne''; Lorraine Franconian: ''Lottringe''; german: Lothringen ; lb, Loutrengen; nl, Lotharingen is a cultural and historical region in Northeastern France, now located in the administrative region of Gr ...

* ,

Savoy Savoy (; frp, Savouè ; french: Savoie ) is a cultural-historical region in the Western Alps. Situated on the cultural boundary between Occitania and Piedmont, the area extends from Lake Geneva in the north to the Dauphiné in the south. Savo ...

* ,

Massif Central The (; oc, Massís Central, ; literally ''"Central Massif"'') is a highland region in south-central France, consisting of mountains and plateaus. It covers about 15% of mainland France. Subject to volcanism that has subsided in the last 10,00 ...

* ,

Lyon Lyon,, ; Occitan: ''Lion'', hist. ''Lionés'' also spelled in English as Lyons, is the third-largest city and second-largest metropolitan area of France. It is located at the confluence of the rivers Rhône and Saône, to the northwest of t ...

* ,

Limoges Limoges (, , ; oc, Lemòtges, locally ) is a city and Communes of France, commune, and the prefecture of the Haute-Vienne Departments of France, department in west-central France. It was the administrative capital of the former Limousin region ...

* ,

Marseille Marseille ( , , ; also spelled in English as Marseilles; oc, Marselha ) is the prefecture of the French department of Bouches-du-Rhône and capital of the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region. Situated in the camargue region of southern Franc ...

* itself in the rest of

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...

* , a stock brokerage firm is mainly owned by

Société Générale Société Générale S.A. (), colloquially known in English as SocGen (), is a French-based multinational financial services company founded in 1864, registered in downtown Paris and headquartered nearby in La Défense. Société Générale ...

but run separately from Société Générale's own French retail banking network. specialises on professionals and small business. It serves about 1.5 million customers in more than 700 stores (2006).

History

started in

Lille Lille ( , ; nl, Rijsel ; pcd, Lile; vls, Rysel) is a city in the northern part of France, in French Flanders. On the river Deûle, near France's border with Belgium, it is the capital of the Hauts-de-France Regions of France, region, the Pref ...

in 1848. After buying a number of small banks, it was, in turn, acquired by

Paribas The Banque de Paris et des Pays-Bas (“Bank of Paris and the Netherlands”), generally referred to from 1982 as Paribas, was a French investment bank based in Paris. In May 2000, it merged with the Banque Nationale de Paris to form BNP Paribas. ...

between 1972 (35% owned) and 1988 (100% owned) but remained run as a separate network. In the following years several regional French banks were brought in the group while retaining their names. In 1984, it was the fifth-ranking French banking group. It rebranded itself, after working with

Creative Business Creative may refer to: *Creativity, phenomenon whereby something new and valuable is created * "Creative" (song), a 2008 song by Leon Jackson * Creative class, a proposed socioeconomic class * Creative destruction, an economic term * Creative dir ...

(a public relations company), with a new logo, graphics of its name, the architecture of its branches, and public relations. It changed its logo from an orange cube to a blue star. In 1997, the whole network with the associated banks was acquired by from Paribas. Since 2000, is 80% owned by Société Générale and 20% by

Dexia Dexia N.V./S.A., or the Dexia Group, is a Franco-Belgian financial institution formed in 1996. At its peak in 2010, it had about 35,200 members of staff and a core shareholders' equity of €19.2 billion. In 2008, the bank entered severe ...

Controversy

In 2010, the French government's (the department in charge of regulating competition) fined eleven banks, including , the sum of €384,900,000 for colluding to charge unjustified fees on check processing, especially for extra fees charged during the transition from paper check transfer to "Exchanges Check-Image" electronic transfer.

References

3rd UPDATE: French Watchdog Fines 11 Banks For Fee Cartel
Elena Bertson, Dow Jones News Wires / Wall Street Journal online, retr 2010 9 20 Collusion in the banking sector
Press Release of Autorité de la concurrence, République Française, 20 September 2010, retrv 2010 9 20

External links

Credit du Nord bank profile
Société Générale {{France-bank-stub