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A former Goldman Sachs banker should be convicted of helping loot billions of dollars from Malaysia's 1MDB sovereign wealth fund and causing "immeasurable" harm, a U.S. prosecutor told jurors in her closing argument on Monday, Reuters reported. Roger Ng, Goldman's former top investment banker for Malaysia, faces charges he helped his former boss Tim Leissner embezzle hundreds of millions of dollars from the fund, launder the proceeds and bribe officials to win business for Goldman. Assistant U.S. Attorney Alixandra Smith said Ng received more than $35 million in kickbacks from the "brazen" bribery and money laundering scheme, and must be held accountable. "The harm to the people of Malaysia is immeasurable," she said. "It is deeply unfair to everyone else who plays by the rules." Ng has pleaded not guilty to conspiring to launder money and violating an anti-corruption law. Leissner pleaded guilty to similar charges in 2018 and agreed to cooperate with prosecutors as their star witness against Ng. Ng's lawyer Marc Agnifilo was expected to begin his closing argument later Monday afternoon. U.S. prosecutors have said Goldman helped 1MDB raise $6.5 billion through three bond sales, but that $4.5 billion was diverted to government officials, bankers and their associates through bribes and kickbacks. Ng is the first, and likely only, person to face trial in the United States over the scheme. Goldman in 2020 paid a nearly $3 billion fine and its Malaysian unit agreed to plead guilty.

Credit Suisse said on Monday that litigation related to Greensill supply chain finance funds (SCFF) could take around five years and warned that some investors would not be able to recover their money, Reuters reported. Credit Suisse racked up a 1.6 billion Swiss franc ($1.73 billion) loss last year when it was hit by the implosion of investment fund Archegos and the collapse of $10 billion in SCFFs linked to insolvent British financier Greensill. "It is expected that litigation will be necessary to enforce claims against individual debtors and the insurance companies, which may take around five years," the Swiss bank said on Monday in a document on its website answering questions from pension fund adviser Ethos. It said that its asset management had taken all necessary steps to collect the outstanding amounts since March 2021, but in some cases refinancing or sales of assets were not yet possible.

Rohit Chopra, director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), said that the agency plans to establish "dedicated units" within its enforcement and supervision divisions to better detect repeat corporate offenders, Reuters reported. In his first speech on enforcement policy since becoming CFPB director in October, Rohit Chopra said regulators have failed to hold large institutions and their executives to the same standards as their smaller counterparts. The bureau is looking at "structural remedies" to hold big companies more accountable for repeated misconduct, such as limiting a company's leverage, revoking government-granted privileges and banning certain business practices, he said. Chopra added that the CFPB will boost collaboration with state licensing officials so that states can better ascertain whether a company's business licenses should be suspended or whether assets should be liquidated. "Regulators in the U.S. have a history of being able to terminate charters and licenses," Chopra said. "Today, this should be considered for all institutions when the facts and circumstances warrant it, not just when it happens to a small firm."

IRS investigators said yesterday that they have uncovered more than $1.8 billion in fraudulent activity related to federal COVID-19 stimulus funds, The Hill reported. Two years after the Trump administration passed the first trillion-dollar stimulus package, which provided $1,200 checks to individuals and forgivable loans to small businesses as the US economy shut down, the IRS said that it has closed 660 criminal cases related to various stimulus bills prompted by the pandemic. “These cases included a broad range of criminal activity, including fraudulently obtained loans, credits and payments meant for American workers, families, and small businesses,” the IRS Criminal Investigation division said in a statement. Many of these are wire fraud cases in which people made false claims about their business or financial situation in order to obtain money from the government. One such case involved the CEO of a nonfunctioning nonprofit organization who pleaded guilty to lying about having 25 employees and an average monthly payroll cost of more than $120,000. He received more than $300,000 from the Paycheck Protection Program, which was deposited into his personal account.

A Louisiana man who funneled students’ financial aid funds to his own bank accounts and falsified business records to get a COVID-19 relief loan has been convicted on several counts of fraud and money laundering, the Associated Press reported. Elliot Sterling was unanimously convicted by a federal jury after an eight-day trial, U.S. Attorney Ronald C. Gathe Jr. said Tuesday in a news release. The charges included five counts of wire fraud connected with a scheme to take money from the Department of Education federal student aid program and another two counts related to defrauding a Small Business Administration loan program designed to help businesses during the pandemic. Sterling was also convicted of six counts of money laundering involving the proceeds of the two wire fraud plans, as well as two counts of financial aid fraud. The jury ordered him to forfeit about $422,600 in proceeds that the FBI seized.

Insurers protecting Florida’s homeowners are going under. And it’s not the state’s infamous storms dragging the firms down — it’s a deluge of lawsuits and fraud, Bloomberg News reported. More companies may follow the two insurers declared insolvent in recent weeks, Tampa, Florida-based Avatar Property & Casualty Insurance Co. and St. Johns Insurance Co., based in Orlando, Florida. And lawmakers failed to pass a bill that could offer a potential remedy before the state’s legislative session wrapped up earlier this month. Insurers, meanwhile, are opting not to renew certain policies, refraining from writing new business and increasing premiums. The pullback offers homeowners few choices: pay up, take the risk of forgoing coverage or throw in their lot with the state’s insurer of last resort, which is already facing an influx of new customers as hurricane season looms. “There are going to be other insolvencies,” said Bruce Lucas, chief executive officer of Tampa-based insurance-technology firm Slide Insurance Holdings Inc. and a veteran of the state’s underwriting industry. “There are just other companies that are too thinly capitalized.” The largest U.S. insurers have spent years shrinking their footprint in Florida to reduce their exposure to violent Atlantic hurricanes. As of the third quarter of last year, companies that primarily write policies in the state control more than three-quarters of the homeowners’ insurance market, according to Kyle Ulrich, president of the Florida Association of Insurance Agents.