AN arrest warrant has been issued for financier Low Taek Jho by Malaysian authorities conducting a probe into troubled state investment fund 1Malaysia Development Berhad, Bloomberg reports today.

Quoting sources, the report said arrest warrants are also being drawn up for former Goldman Sachs banker Roger Ng and a former 1MDB official Shahrol Halmi.

The Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission has also issued an arrest warrant for Nik Faisal Ariff Kamil, a former 1MDB official, it said.

The four individuals have not been charged with any wrongdoing.

MACC in a statement earlier today sought public help to trace Low, a Penang-born businessman said to be the mastermind behind the siphoning off funds from 1MDB, and Nik Faisal.

Bloomberg said Ng was Goldman Sach’s head of Southeast Asia sales and trading, who had helped 1MDB raise funds.

Ng resigned in April 2014 and now works as the Asia director in an energy drink manufacturer called Celsius Holding.

Goldman Sachs also netted US$593 million as fees for arranging bond deals for 1MDB, which has come under scrutiny from regulators around the world, including agencies in the United States and Singapore. 

“The bank said in November it has received requests from various government bodies and is cooperating,” Bloomberg report said, adding that Singaporean authorities had previously interviewed Goldman Sachs employees who had worked on 1MDB’s bond offerings.

One of its senior executives Tim Leissner has been barred from the US securities industry. He quit the bank in 2016.

Meanwhile, Shahrol was chief executive officer of 1MDB from 2009 to 2013 and then a director until 2016.

The parliamentary Public Accounts Committee (PAC) in 2016 found that Shahrol should be held responsible for the “weaknesses and constraints” faced by the state investor.

The PAC report also found at least US$4.2 billion of unauthorised or unverified transactions. – June 7, 2018.