Najib received US$681mil from Singapore entity, court told

BNM analyst says the 1MDB-linked funds were sent by Tanore Finance Corporation, said to be controlled by a Jho Low aide.

(FMT) – A Bank Negara Malaysia analyst told the High Court in Najib Razak’s 1MDB trial that more than US$681 million was sent to the former prime minister’s account from a Singaporean entity 10 years ago.

Adam Ariff Roslan said the entity in question, Tanore Finance Corporation, had on March 21 that year received funds originating from 1MDB.

He said 1MDB received a sum of US$2.72 billion on March 19, 2013 from raising bonds to develop the Tun Razak Exchange (TRX) project.

However, Adam said, a couple of days later, a total of US$1.06 billion was moved to two fiduciary funds – Devonshire Funds Ltd (US$646.5 million) and Enterprise Emerging Markets Fund or EEMF (US$414.1 million).

On March 21 that year, a sum of US$640 million was transferred from Devonshire – to Tanore (US$210 million) and Granton Property Holding Ltd (US$430 million).

The prosecution said in its opening statement that Tanore and Granton were controlled by Tan Kim Loong, an aide of Low Taek Jho, better known as Jho Low.

Adam also told the court that the US$430 million in Granton’s account was subsequently transferred to Tanore on the same day.

“EEMF, too, sent US$250 million to Tanore (at the same time),” he said.

Adam said Najib subsequently received more than US$681 million from Tanore between March 22 and April 10, 2013.

Najib is standing trial on 25 charges of abuse of power and money laundering over alleged 1MDB funds amounting to RM2.28 billion deposited into his AmBank accounts between February 2011 and December 2014.

The hearing before Justice Collin Lawrence Sequerah continues.