ANOTHER TOP PRIVATE BANK CAUGHT IN NAJIB'S 1MDB WEB OF DUBIOUS DEALS: Edmond de Rothschild to cooperate in Luxembourg probe

The Luxembourg unit of Edmond de Rothschild Group, a private bank that manages money on behalf of wealthy clients, said it is “cooperating” with an official investigation of money that may have flowed from a Malaysian government investment fund at the center of various world-wide corruption probes.

The fund, 1Malaysia Development Bhd., was established by Malaysian Prime MinisterNajib Razak in 2009. The office of Luxembourg’s state prosecutor said Thursday that it is investigating whether hundreds of millions of dollars sent to an account at a bank in Luxembourg originated from 1MDB.

“Edmond de Rothschild Europe is actively cooperating in the judicial proceedings,” a spokeswoman for the bank told The Wall Street Journal. An official at the Luxembourg justice department declined to comment on the identity of the bank in question.

The Luxembourg investigation widens probes of 1MDB already under way by authorities in Switzerland, Malaysia, Singapore, Hong Kong and Abu Dhabi. Swiss authorities said in January that 1MDB-related losses from misappropriation could reach $4 billion. The Luxembourg prosecutor said its case was connected to the investigation in Switzerland.

1MDB was created to invest in local energy and real-estate projects to boost the Malaysian economy. The fund amassed $11 billion in debt which it has struggled to repay. Last July,The Wall Street Journal reported that almost $700 million was transferred to Mr. Najib’s bank accounts via a web of entities, money which investigators believe originated with 1MDB. 1MDB has denied sending money to Mr. Najib’s accounts and denied wrongdoing and said it is cooperating with probes.

Edmond de Rothschild Group had €150 billion ($170.8 billion) of assets and 2,700 employees as of June 30. The bank was started by Edmond de Rothschild in Paris in 1953.Benjamin de Rothschild succeeded his father as head of the group in 1997. Last year, Benjamin appointed his wife, Ariane, chairwoman of the executive committee.

The Luxembourg prosecutor said in a statement Thursday that its inquiry is focused on the movement of funds through a number of accounts of offshore companies in Singapore, Switzerland and Luxembourg. The investigation centers on the flow of 1MDB money related to two bonds the fund issued in May and October 2012. 1MDB, in a statement, said it had not been contacted by authorities in Luxembourg.

The Luxembourg prosecutor didn’t give details of the bonds but appears to refer to two bonds that Goldman Sachs Group Inc. sold for 1MDB in May and October 2012, raising a total of $3.5 billion. A spokesperson for Goldman Sachs declined to comment.

Separately, The U.S. Department of Justice has asked banks including Deutsche Bank AGand J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. for documents related to their interactions with 1MDB, according to people familiar with the matter. Officials from the department traveled to Kuala Lumpur recently to interview the banks, the people said. Neither is a focus of the Justice Department’s probe, they added. The Department of Justice and 1MDB didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment.

Deutsche Bank, as 1MDB’s banker, was involved in sending $1 billion of the fund’s money out of the country in 2009, according to documents that form part of a probe into 1MDB by Malaysia’s auditor general. The money was meant for a joint venture between 1MDB and a Saudi oil company, but $700 million of the total instead ended up being transferred to another company, the documents show. What happened to the funds is unclear. J.P. Morgan was the banker for 1MDB’s joint venture with the Saudi company. Both J.P. Morgan and Deutsche Bank declined to comment. - WSJ