Société Générale was founded on May 4, 1864, with the personal approval of Napoleon III. It was originally a private bank. In 1870, the Societe Generale had 15 branches in Paris and 32 branches in other French provinces. In 1871, a permanent office was established in London, England. By 1889, there were 148 service points.

Since 1894, Societe Generale has collected private and corporate deposits and issued corporate bonds in France and Russia to provide financing arrangements for industrialists and traders. In the 1920s, Société Générale slowly became the leader in French banking. Nationalized in 1946. In 1979, the state controlled 93.5% of the bank's capital, and later transferred to full control. The current name was changed in 1983.

In 1986, it had 2,873 branches at home and abroad. The overseas branches were mainly located in the United Kingdom, Belgium, Switzerland, Austria, Spain, Tunisia, Morocco, Congo, Japan, and Iran. , the United States and Canada and other 30 countries and regions. In the same year, the French government decided to privatize 60 nationalized companies. On June 15, 1987, it decided to sell Société Générale shares to the public, so Société Générale became a private bank again.

In 1993, its total assets were US$257.838 billion, ranking 4th in France and 27th among the world's 1,000 largest banks.

On January 24, 2008, the bank announced that one of its traders, Jér?me Kerviel, had illegally traded European stock price index futures in the futures market. Bringing losses of 4.82 billion euros. Together with the 2 billion euros loss from subprime mortgages, Societe Generale needs to seek a capital injection of about 5.5 billion euros from the outside world. Societe Generale's shares were temporarily suspended from trading that day.

As of the end of December 2006, the bank's total assets reached US$1.26 trillion, its turnover reached US$84.5 billion, and its net profit was US$6.45 billion.