A FORMER Goldman Sachs banker linked to the 1MDB scandal has been barred from the US securities industry, reports The Wall Street Journal.

Tim Leissner, who was once based in Singapore, was slapped with the ban on September 11 by the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (Finra) for failure to provide documents and other information related to his departure from Goldman Sachs in early 2016.

Leissner was the bank’s Southeast Asia chairman and produced an unauthorised letter vouching for Low Taek Jho, better known as Jho Low, the central figure in the US Department of Justice’s probes into billions of dollars allegedly siphoned off state investor 1Malaysia Development Bhd.

Leissner was suspended by Goldman over his role in 1MDB and his work on an Indonesian mining deal, and left the bank last year. Goldman raised US$6.5 billion for 1MDB and earned nearly US$600 million in fees.

“Without admitting or denying the findings, Mr Leissner consented to the sanction and to the entry of findings,” the regulator said. Finra’s probe into Leissner was centred on the reference letter.

In June 2015, Leissner wrote to Banque Havilland, a small Luxembourg private bank, vouching for Low, who wanted to open an account there, WSJ said.

The DoJ has launched a criminal investigation into funds allegedly siphoned off from 1MDB and has sought to delay civil suits filed in the past two years to forfeit more than US$1 billion (RM4.3 billion) in real estate and other assets.

In the civil cases, the department alleged that between 2009 and 2015, more than US$4.5 billion belonging to 1MDB was diverted by high-level officials of the state investor and their associates.

In June, the DoJ filed another suit to seize US$540 million in assets, including the US$165 million yacht Equanimity, owned by Jho, and the rights to Dumb and Dumber To. – October 4, 2017.