Société Générale — Board/Management Information 2009

Apr 29, 2009

Press Release

Paris, 29 April 2009

Message from Daniel Bouton

I have decided to put an end to my mandate as Chairman of the Board of Directors of Société Générale as of 6th May. The Board will elect a new Chairman at its meeting on that same day.

Société Générale has experienced under my management ten years of strong and harmonious growth for its customers, its employees and its shareholders, employees being the company's biggest shareholders. This has been achieved with a good balance between retail banking activities in France and abroad and a very fine corporate and investment bank.

The firm demonstrated exceptional unity after the Kerviel fraud. Immediately after it was uncovered, I tendered my resignation. The Board refused it. The capital increase, guaranteed within 48 hours, and subsequently successful, saved the company and demonstrated the confidence of its shareholders. Today, the transition initiated a year ago with the appointment of Frédéric Oudéa as CEO comes to an end. The repeated attacks against me personally in France for the past fifteen months affect me, but most of all, they risk harming the bank and its 163,000 employees. In the present financial and economic storm, priority must go to unity. It is better for me to withdraw, proud of having led a wonderful company.

Like any manager, I have certainly made mistakes, but the strategy adopted by Société Générale has made it one of the finest banks in the euro zone.

I have faith in Société Générale's future.

Société Générale

Société Générale is one of the largest financial services groups in the euro-zone. The Group employs 163,000 people worldwide in three key businesses:

• Retail Banking & Financial Services: Société Générale serves more than 30 million individual customers worldwide.
• Global Investment Management & Services: Société Générale is one of the largest banks in the euro-zone in terms of assets under custody (EUR 2 560 billion, December 2008) and under management (EUR 336 billion, December 2008).

Corporate & Investment Banking: Société Générale ranks among the leading banks worldwide in euro capital markets, derivatives and structured finance.

Société Générale is included in 3 socially-responsible investment indexes: FTSE4Good, ASPI and Ethibel. www.socgen.com

PRESS RELATIONS SOCIETE GENERALE Stéphanie CARSON-PARKER +33 (0)1 42 14 95 77 Hélène MAZIER +33 (0)1 58 98 72 74

Laura SCHALK +33 (0)1 42 14 52 86 P.A +33(0)1 42 14 49 48 Fax +33(0)1 42 14 28 98 SOCIETE GENERALE COMM/PRS 75886 PARIS CEDEX 18 www.socgen.com A French corporation with share capital of EUR 725,909,055 552 120 222 RCS PARIS