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KUALA LUMPUR: 1Malaysia Development Bhd (1MDB), the state fund at the center of a massive corruption scandal, still had an estimated RM32.3 billion in outstanding debt in September, the government said today.
Established in 2009 by former Prime Minister Najib Razak, authorities are investigating how billions of dollars went missing from 1MDB, a disappearance that the government says led the Finance Ministry to bail out the fund.
Malaysia said in 2018 that the government would have to pay around US $ 13 billion (RM54 billion) of 1MDB fees.
Since April 2017, the government has provided RM9.4 billion in loans and advances to help 1MDB meet its financial commitments and debt obligations, according to the 2021 fiscal outlook report, released ahead of the government’s budget announcement of today.
Malaysia also recovered a total of RM13.4 billion in assets tied to 1MDB’s financial trajectory at the end of September, according to the report.
The amount includes around RM2.6 billion in cash and assets recovered and returned to Malaysia by US authorities, as well as US $ 2.5 billion paid by Goldman Sachs to resolve a Malaysian investigation into the investment bank’s role in the 1MDB scandal.
Goldman Sachs, which helped 1MDB raise a total of $ 6.5 billion in bonds, has also guaranteed that it will help Malaysia recover an additional $ 1.4 billion in 1MDB-linked assets.
The United States has said about $ 4.5 billion of 1MDB was stolen in an elaborate scheme that spread around the world and involved high-level fund officials, former Prime Minister Najib, Goldman executives and others.
Malaysian authorities say billions of dollars remain unaccounted for.
