Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad said on Tuesday that he is looking forward to reaching an amicable settlement with Goldman Sachs over the 1MDB scandal that rocked global finance. However, he noted that the other party's settlement over is "too small" at this point.
In an exclusive interview with Reuters on Tuesday, Mahathir revealed that the bank offered "one point something billion" but for the Asian leader, "at the moment their offer is too small."
Mahathir explained that Malaysia wants to avoid getting the case into court but the bank should come up with "a reasonable sum" to settle the problem. He added that the Malaysian government demanded $7.5 billion from the banking leader but talks are still underway.
He further noted that the government continues to discuss aspects of the amount demanded with the bank. He acknowledged that the settlement may result in lowering the amount and that he is hopeful the two sides will reach an agreement "soon."
Finally, Mahathir warned that while he is optimistic of an agreement to be reached soon enough, failure to reach a deal will force Malaysia to bring the issue to court for proper jurisdiction.
The aging Malaysian chief's comments came after his country charged Goldman and 17 directors of different units under the bank for allegedly delivering misleading accounts to investors on bond sales.
The misleading of investors allegedly reached $6.5 billion in bond sales that Goldman helped raise for 1Malaysia Development Bhd (1MDB), the sovereign wealth fund of Malaysia.
It is worth noting that the scandal took place under then Prime Minister Najib Razak, with American officials stating that around $4.5 billion was siphoned from the fund. At that time, details about the incident were scarce, until investigations kicked off.
During his Monday trial, Najib told the Malaysian High Court that he was "shocked" to find out businessman Low Taek Jho, also called Jho Low, cooperated with AmBank to manage his financial accounts, TODAY reported.
Najib further defended himself in court, stating that had he known of Jho Low's actions, he would have stopped them. He argued that he was not aware Jho asked the bank to use several specific names in managing the accounts he had with AmBank.
"Jho Low chose not to inform me of his involvement concerning dealings related to my account," Najib said after witnessing Ms. Yu revealed that she was instructed by Low through BlackBerry messenger chats to managing the former PM's accounts.
It remains to be seen whether Goldman will settle with Malaysia out of court. However, many analysts believe it is the best path to take moving forward.
