Societe Generale profit falls as Greece takes toll

PARIS (Reuters) - Societe Generale <SOGN.PA> fell short of second-quarter profit and revenue forecasts, hampered by its Greek exposure, and warned its 2012 earnings goals would be tough to reach.

France's second-biggest bank said its target of 6 billion euros ($8.55 billion) in net profit next year, reiterated in May, would now be "difficult to achieve" against a tougher economic backdrop.

The bank took a 395 million euro pretax hit on its exposure to Greece because of its contribution to a bailout plan, the bank said in a statement on Wednesday.

This led to a 31 percent drop in quarterly net income, which at 747 million euros was well short of the average estimate of 1.15 billion in a poll of six analysts by Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.

Revenue also stumbled, falling 2.6 percent compared with the second quarter of 2010.

At 6.5 billion euros, it was also below Thomson Reuters projections of 6.62 billion euros, according to the average of 12 analyst estimates.

($1=.7017 Euro)

(Reporting by Sarah White; Editing by James Regan)