The contract covers statutory auditing services for the Banque de France provided by 1 firm of statutory auditors over a period of six financial years.

• verify that the Banque de France's annual individual accounts are regular and truthful and give a true and fair view of the results of operations for the past financial year and of the financial position and assets;

• verify the accuracy and consistency of the information given in the report on the financial situation and results of the Banque de France with the annual individual accounts;

• Prepare a general report summarizing the results of these audits;

• verifying the compliance of the accounts of the pension scheme of permanent staff with the French accounting rules and principles applicable to social security schemes and bodies;

• prepare, pursuant to Article 313-17-1 of the AMF General Regulation, a report on the measures taken by the Bank to meet its obligations to protect its clients' holdings of financial instruments;

• Participates as required in meetings of the Audit Committee;

• participate in the meeting of the General Council approving the annual accounts, in accordance with Article L.142-6 of the French Monetary and Financial Code;

• Present the results of their work to the relevant units and to the Bank's management.

In addition, as a result of Banque de France's membership of the Eurosystem, the external auditor will have to conduct audits on the instructions of the ECB's statutory auditors. These audits will focus on:

• compliance with the procedures set out in the "Guideline on the management of ECB's foreign reserve assets");

• confirmation of the ECB's gold stock and foreign exchange reserves managed by the Banque de France as at 31 December;

• confirmation of the amount of euro banknotes put into circulation by the Banque de France on 31 December;

• Confirmation of the balance TARGET2 as of December 31.