Rogue trader goes before court in Paris

At the time, more than two years ago, the hit taken by Societ Generale was considered history's biggest trading fraud, but it was soon dwarfed by the global financial crisis, the fall of Lehman Brothers and the Bernard Madoff multibillion-dollar Ponzi scheme in the US.

Kerviel has already laid out his defence in a book and interviews with French media, casting himself as an everyman who got carried away, a scapegoat for the bank, the victim of an out-of-control banking system.

It is a tactic that seems crafted to tap into popular discontent at a time of financial scandals and economic turmoil.

His case destabilised the banking sector, already on the verge of the 2008 meltdown, and heightened pressure for better financial regulation, still high on today's agenda for governments worldwide.

His defence lawyers contend his supervisors were aware of his risks but did not stop them as long as he was making money for Societ Generale.