Malaysia says US returns $460 million in recovered 1MDB funds

KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia on Wednesday said the U.S. Department of Justice has returned 1.9 billion ringgit ($460.22 million) of funds recovered from assets related to sovereign fund 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB).

Malaysian and U.S. investigators say at least $4.5 billion was stolen from 1MDB between 2009 and 2014, in a wide-ranging scandal that has implicated high-level officials, banks and financial institutions around the world.

The United States has been returning funds it has recovered from seized assets that were allegedly bought with stolen 1MDB money.

Malaysia has so far received 16.05 billion ringgit ($3.89 billion) of seized and repatriated 1MDB funds, the finance ministry said in a statement.

It plans to use the recovered funds to repay liabilities of 1MDB and its former unit SRC.

The Malaysian government has so far repaid 12.4 billion of 1MDB's debt and 3.1 billion ringgit of SRC's debt, the finance ministry said.

1MDB still has 39.8 billion ringgit in outstanding debt, while the unit SRC has 2.57 billion ringgit of remaining debt, the ministry said.

Earlier this week, the now-defunct 1MDB sued units of Deutsche Bank, J.P. Morgan and Coutts & Co to recover billions in alleged losses from the fund.

($1 = 4.1285 ringgit)