SocGen defends Robert Day's share dealings

PARIS (Reuters) - French bank Societe Generale defended on Tuesday recent share dealings made by board member Robert Day, who had sold off SocGen shares a few weeks before SocGen revealed an internal fraud at the bank.

"Mr. Day and his family's trusts and charitable foundations sold Societe Generale shares in December 2007 and up to 18 January 2008, which was a window of time where such trades were permitted under Societe Generale's trading policies for directors. All required disclosures were made," the bank said in a statement.

"No inside information was used in any way with respect to these December and January sales," it added.

The bank said that Day had no prior knowledge of losses alleged to have been caused by junior SocGen trader Jerome Kerviel.

"In particular, before these trades were made, Mr. Day, like the other board members, was not advised of Mr. Kerviel's trading losses," it said.

"Neither was he advised, like the other non-executive board members, that additional subprime-related write-downs or reserves would be made. Such write-downs and reserves were presented to the board for the first time on January 20, 2008. Mr. Day has pledged his cooperation into any inquiries of this matter," added the bank.

(Reporting by Sudip Kar-Gupta)