US 'subpoenas Goldman' in 1MDB link

US 'subpoenas Goldman' in 1MDB link

US authorities have issued subpoenas to Goldman Sachs Group Inc for documents related to the bank's dealings with scandal-hit Malaysian state fund 1MDB, the Wall Street Journal reported late on Friday.

Goldman received the subpoenas earlier this year from the US Department of Justice (DoJ) and the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), the Journal reported, citing a person familiar with the matter.

The authorities also want to interview current and former Goldman employees in connection with the inquiries, but none of those meetings had occurred by Friday, WSJ said.

The Department of Justice and the SEC declined to comment. No one from Goldman Sachs was available for comment outside regular US business hours.

1MDB, which was founded by Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak in 2009 shortly after he came to office, is being investigated for money-laundering in at least six countries including the United States, Singapore and Switzerland. Mr Najib has consistently denied any wrongdoing.

US law enforcement officials are attempting to identify whether Goldman violated federal law after failing to flag a transaction in Malaysia, the Journal reported in June.

New York state regulators have also asked the Wall Street bank for details about probes into billions of dollars it raised in a bond offering for 1MDB, Reuters reported in June, citing a person familiar with the matter.

The UK newspaper The Guardian this week published a lengthy expose on the 1MDB scandal, which was triggered by revelations made by whistleblower Xavier Justo, a former Swiss banker.

Justo is currently in jail in Thailand after he was convicted of attempting to extort money from his former employer, PetroSaudi. Many of the investigations into 1MDB relate to money allegedly diverted from a joint venture with PetroSaudi.

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