BNP Paribas has uncovered an embarrassing alleged €15 million fraud by one of its own accountants, who is said to have used the money to deck her small Paris apartment out with some of the most expensive antiques and art on the French market.

While BNP is hailing the discovery as a success for its internal controls, questions are being raised in the French bank about how the low-ranking accountant could have escaped without her scam being detected for more than three years.

Perhaps it was BNP's record profit of €4.7 billion last year that convinced the accountant, that she could get away with embezzling €15 million without France's biggest bank by market capitalisation noticing.

It was only after the woman charged with handling the bank's purchasing accounts started getting greedy that she was caught. Auditors rang the alarm bell after finding a €6.8 million hole in the 2004 accounts. The woman is alleged to have used the names of legitimate suppliers of the bank, but switched their account details with those of antique dealers.

The French press have delighted in listing some of the pieces of 17th and 18th century furniture found in the accountant's three-bedroom apartment in a high-rise block in northern Paris.

A number of France's most prestigious antique dealers are being investigated by police to find out why they did not raise questions after delivering furniture worth hundreds of thousands of euros to such a small apartment.

The antiques, including Louis XVI armchairs and silver chandeliers, have been impounded. BNP is expected to sell them to recoup some of the lost money. But it is understood there are worries that the woman may have massively overpaid for some items. -