By TOM WRIGHT in Hong Kong and JUSTIN BAER in New York
Wall Street Journal
March 10, 2016

Wall Street firm hired daughter of close ally to Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak

Goldman Sachs Group Inc. hired the daughter of a close ally to Malaysia’s prime minister around the time the firm’s bankers were pitching business to the country’s government investment fund, people familiar with the matter said.

Goldman is looking into the hiring as part of its investigation into the firm’s actions related to the Malaysia fund and into the Wall Street firm’s former Southeast Asia chairman, Tim Leissner, said one of the people.

The probe is also part of its broader investigation into the hiring of relatives of government officials or other well-connected people, the person said. Goldman is among several international banks under investigation by U.S. authorities to determine whether their hiring practices violated antibribery laws, The Wall Street Journal has previously reported. The Foreign Corrupt Practices Act bans U.S. companies from giving anything of value to a foreign official to gain an unfair advantage or business favors. Goldman has declined to comment on the U.S. probe.

Neither Goldman nor Mr. Leissner have been accused of wrongdoing. Read the rest of this entry »