BRADLEY HOPE in New York, SIMON CLARK in London and YANTOULTRA NGUI in Kuala Lumpur
Wall Street Journal
April 1, 2016

Investigators in three countries studying trail of cash from Malaysia to Abu Dhabi, offshore bank accounts

Authorities in three countries investigating a Malaysian government investment fund appear to be focusing on what happened to the proceeds of $3.5 billion in bonds sold by the fund in 2012, according to people familiar with the matter.

Investigators in the United Arab Emirates, Luxembourg and Switzerland are looking at the trail of cash from Malaysia to Abu Dhabi and to offshore bank accounts for a portion of the bond proceeds that appears to have gone missing, the people said.

Authorities in the U.A.E. have frozen the personal assets of and issued travel bans to two former executives of an Abu Dhabi sovereign-wealth fund that had extensive dealings with the Malaysian fund, 1Malaysia Development Bhd., known as 1MDB, the people said.

The UAE’s actions indicate authorities have moved ahead in their probe into the dealings of Khadem Al Qubaisi and Mohammed Badawy Al Husseiny, both of whom had close connections to 1MDB, the people said. Mr. Al Qubaisi is an Emirati who was the managing director of an $80 billion Abu Dhabi investment fund, International Petroleum Investment Company. Mr. Al Husseiny, an American, was chief executive of another government investment company, Aabar Investments PJS, which is owned by IPIC.

The U.A.E.’s central bank issued the asset freezes, the people said, though it isn’t clear which U.A.E. government agency is running the investigation. Read the rest of this entry »

Luxemburger Wort – English Edition
1 April, 2016

Money laundering probe

(AFP) Luxembourg on Thursday launched a money laundering probe linked to a corruption scandal embroiling Malaysian Premier Najib Razak who is accused of using money in a state-run fund for his own purposes.

Najib, 62, has been under fire over allegations that billions of dollars were stolen from 1MDB, the now struggling state firm he founded, and his acceptance of a $681 million overseas payment.

Reports have also emerged of the luxurious lifestyles, lavish spending and jet-set travel arrangements of his family, stoking calls for his resignation.

The Luxembourg prosecutor’s office said in a statement that it had launched the probe “following revelations about the alleged diversion of funds from 1MDB”. Read the rest of this entry »

By TOM WRIGHT and BRADLEY HOPE
Wall Street Journal
March 30, 2016

Accounts of prime minister paid out $15 million for clothes, jewelry and a car

HONOLULU, Hawaii—On Christmas Eve 2014, Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak stepped onto Hawaii’s 18-hole Kaneohe Klipper course for a round of golf diplomacy with U.S. President Barack Obama.

Off the fairways, another side of Mr. Najib’s time in office was on display. Two days earlier, the prime minister’s credit card was charged $130,625 to Chanel in Honolulu, according to Malaysian investigation documents. A person who works at a Chanel store in the upscale Ala Moana Center recalls Mr. Najib’s wife shopping there just before Christmas.

The credit card was paid from one of several private bank accounts owned by Mr. Najib that global investigators believe received hundreds of millions of dollars diverted from a government investment fund set up by the prime minister in 2009. The fund, 1Malaysia Development Bhd., or 1MDB, today is at the center of corruption probes by authorities in Malaysia and at least five other nations.

The Malaysian investigation documents, viewed by The Wall Street Journal, contain bank-transfer information that provides the most complete picture to date of the money that flowed through the prime minister’s accounts over a five-year period, the majority of it, investigators say, originating from 1MDB.

They show for the first time how some of the money in Mr. Najib’s accounts allegedly was used for personal expenses. That included $15 million in spending on clothes, jewelry and a car, according to the bank-transfer information, involving stores in the U.S., Malaysia, Italy and elsewhere. Read the rest of this entry »

Amanda Hodge
South East Asia correspondent
The Australian
APRIL 2, 2016

On November 1, 2011 Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak received a personal windfall pledge so astonishing in size and nature that even close political allies have described it as “too good to be true”.

In language akin to that of a classic Nigerian email scam, Saudi Prince Saud Abdul Aziz Majid Al Saud praised Najib for his work in “governing Malaysia using Islamic principles”.

“In view of the friendship we have developed over the years and your new ideas as a modern Islamic leader, in addition to my earlier commitment, I hereby grant you an additional sum of up to $US375 million only (‘Gift’) which shall be remitted to you at such times and in such manner as I deem fit, either directly through my personal bank or through my instructed company bank accounts (such as Blackstone Asia Real Estate Partners limited),” the mystery prince wrote on private office letterhead.

“You shall have absolute discretion to determine how the Gift shall be utilised …. This is merely a token gesture on my part but it is my way of contributing to the development of Islam to the world.”

“For clarification, I do not expect to receive any personal benefit whether directly or indirectly as a result of the Gift,” he added.

In an act of extraordinary foresight — that someone might eventually question the hundreds of millions flowing into the Malaysian Prime Minister’s personal bank account — the letter goes on to indemnify him from suggestion of wrongdoing.

“The Gift should not in any way be construed as an act of corruption since this is against the practice of Islam and I personally do not encourage such practices in any manner whatsoever.”

The letter, obtained by Four Corners and published for the first time this week, is signed HRH Prince Saudi Abdulaziz Al Saud, but there is no further clarification of who he might be in the sprawling pantheon of Saudi family dynasties. No address, no email, no telephone number. Read the rest of this entry »

by Stephanie Bodoni/Shamim Adam
Bloomberg
March 31, 2016

Authorities in Luxembourg and Singapore are investigating transactions involving 1Malaysia Development Bhd. as the Malaysian state fund faces expanding probes into allegations of embezzlement and money laundering.

Prosecutors in Luxembourg said they started an investigation of 1MDB, as the fund is known, after finding “concrete clues” of embezzlement from companies owned by the fund via accounts in Singapore, Switzerland and Luxembourg. In response to questions about 1MDB, the Singapore central bank said it is conducting a “thorough review of various transactions as well as fund flows” through its banking system.

“The alleged facts concern in particular the amounts paid during the issuance of two bonds in May and October 2012,” Luxembourgish prosecutors said in an e-mailed statement. They will seek to “retrace the origin of four transfers during 2012 and one transfer in early 2013 for a total of several hundred million dollars, to an offshore company with an account in a bank in” Luxembourg. Read the rest of this entry »

The Australian
APRIL 1, 2016

Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak is doing neither himself nor the standing of his country any good by being so obdurate over the corruption charges that have been levelled against him. Lashing out at media (specifically Australian journalists) over reporting of the scandal and threatening members of the Malaysian Bar who have been critical of him with prosecution under draconian, colonial era sedition laws heighten concerns about his authoritarian government.

Mr Najib’s refusal to discuss, much less provide a credible explanation for, the $1 billion linked to the debt-laden sovereign wealth fund 1Malaysia Development Berhad that landed in his personal bank accounts is unhelpful. He should realise that even in countries that are major regional economic and strategic partners such as Australia — which long has been strongly linked to Kuala Lumpur through the Five Power Defence Arrangements and was closely allied with it in helping in the aftermath of the Malaysia Airlines MH370 and MH17 disasters — there is deepening concern about the fallout from the scandal. The US, too, is showing signs of dismay. Read the rest of this entry »

Shamim Adam/Laura Zelenko
Bloomberg
March 31, 2016

Former investment banker Arul Kanda took a job in Malaysia last year and walked into the crossfire of the country’s biggest political crisis since Prime Minister Najib Razak came to power in 2009.

Now, even as the finances of 1Malaysia Development Bhd. are being investigated in at least three countries, Kanda, president of the government-linked fund, says his job sorting out the organization is done.

“I only signed up for one-third of what I ended up doing,” he said in an interview on Wednesday at the fund’s headquarters in Kuala Lumpur. “I did not sign up for the investigations because that happened after I joined, and I definitely didn’t sign up for the extent of the comms-slash-politics that I had to deal with.”

Kanda was brought in in January 2015 when the debt-ridden fund was teetering on the edge of default. Within months the company became embroiled in allegations of financial irregularities that sparked probes in Malaysia, Singapore and Switzerland. 1MDB, whose advisory board is headed by Najib, has consistently denied wrongdoing.

Kanda echoes statements by Najib and other government officials that the allegations are unfounded and politically motivated. He said 1MDB hasn’t been contacted by any foreign legal authorities to help with investigations. Read the rest of this entry »

Max Abelson/ Elffie Chew
Bloomberg
March 30, 2016

The prime minister of Malaysia had a message for the crowd at the Grand Hyatt San Francisco in September 2013. “We cannot have an egalitarian society — it’s impossible to have an egalitarian society,” Najib Razak said. “But certainly we can achieve a more equitable society.”

Tim Leissner, one of Goldman Sachs Group Inc.’s star bankers, enjoyed the festivities that night with model Kimora Lee Simmons, who’s now his wife. In snapshots she posted to Twitter, she’s sitting next to Najib’s wife, and then standing between him and Leissner. Everyone smiled.

The good times didn’t last. At least $681 million landed in the prime minister’s personal bank accounts that year, money his government has said was a gift from the Saudi royal family. The windfall triggered turmoil for him, investigations into the state fund he oversees and trouble for Goldman Sachs, which helped it raise $6.5 billion. Leissner, the firm’s Southeast Asia chairman, left last month after questions about the fund, his work on an Indonesian mining deal and an allegedly inaccurate reference letter.

Few corporations have mastered the mix of money and power like New York-based Goldman Sachs, whose alumni have become U.S. lawmakers, Treasury secretaries and central bankers. Leissner’s rise and fall shows how lucrative and fraught it can be when the bank exports that recipe worldwide. Read the rest of this entry »