Impact of new levy on French bank

Citing a European Union report prepared for last month's European Council meeting, the article said Dutch group ING and Denmark's Danske Bank would be the next worst hit, losing 21 and 15 per cent of pre-tax profits respectively.

A Credit Agricole spokeswoman was unavailable for comment. The bank said its own calculations suggested it would pay 64 million euros in French tax, or 4 per cent of 2009 pre-tax profit, describing its exposure to other countries' levies as "negligible."

Credit Agricole reported 1.5 billion euros in 2009 pre-tax profit. It is France's third-biggest listed bank and is majority owned by a network of regional lenders.

France, Britain and Germany have introduced levies this month, while seven other countries including Belgium and Denmark have similar plans or are poised to introduce them, it was claimed. Though most European countries agree they would like to tax banks more, they disagree over how.