Jho Low stole US$1.42bil from Goldman’s 1MDB deals, says FBI agent

 

Jho Low was the biggest recipient among 16 people of funds raised by Goldman Sachs in bond deals for 1MDB, Roger Ng’s US trial was told on Monday. (Bloomberg pic)

NEW YORK: Fugitive financier Low Taek Jho, or Jho Low, the alleged mastermind of the 1MDB scandal, stole US$1.42 billion from bond transactions that Goldman Sachs Group Inc arranged for the Malaysian wealth fund, a Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) agent who traced the funds testified.

Eric Van Dorn cited the sum from the witness stand on Monday in the bribery trial of former Goldman banker Roger Ng.

Former prime minister Najib Razak reaped US$756 million of the US$6.5 billion total, Van Dorn told the jury in federal court in Brooklyn, New York.

Khadem al-Qubaisi, a former managing director of Abu Dhabi’s state-owned International Petroleum Investment Co, which guaranteed the 1MDB transactions, received US$472.8 million, he said.

Ng is the only Goldman banker to go to trial over the epic looting of 1MDB.

Van Dorn, who said he tracked how the money was siphoned off to at least 16 recipients, told the jury that Ng got US$35.1 million from two of the three bond transactions, while former Goldman banker Tim Leissner, who pleaded guilty to the fraud and is cooperating with the US against Ng, got US$73.4 million.

Najib was convicted in Malaysia and sentenced to 12 years in prison in connection with SRC International, a former subsidiary of 1MDB. He is appealing the conviction.

A spokesman for Najib did not immediately return an email seeking comment on Van Dorn’s testimony. - FMT