U.S. Seeks Seizure of Fugitive Low’s Paris Apartment, Art Work
(Bloomberg) -- U.S. prosecutors expanded their effort to seize assets that fugitive Low Taek Jho allegedly bought with money stolen from Malaysia's 1MDB state investment fund, including a Paris apartment and art works by Andy Warhol and Jean-Michel Basquiat.
Forfeiture lawsuits filed Wednesday in Los Angeles seek to recover $96 million in assets, the Justice Department said in a statement. The U.S. has filed dozens of such claims over four years to seize $1.8 billion in assets from Low and alleged associates, including luxury homes in Beverly Hills, London and New York, a private airplane and a super yacht. So far, about $1.1 billion has been collected.
Among the items targeted in the latest lawsuits is a $6 million Warhol “Campbell's Soup Can” painting and a $10 million work by Claude Monet. Prosecutors already took possession of a $4 million Basquiat self-portrait and $1 million Warhol “Round Jackie” portrait that Low gifted to others, according to the complaint.
The U.S. has sent about $600 million back to Malaysia as part of its effort to seize and liquidate the assets. That includes real estate, business investments, art work and jewelry, that Low, his family and his cronies acquired with the money they are accused of stealing from 1MDB after it was set up in 2009.
Read More: How Malaysia's 1MDB Scandal Shook the Financial World
While Low has denied wrongdoing, he and his family last year dropped their defense of the forfeiture lawsuits that have been pending in federal court in Los Angeles, which has allowed the government to seize more than $700 million in assets. Some of the real estate, including luxury condominiums in New York and mansions in Beverly Hills, have been put on the market.
©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
-
Opinion | India at 38: From Innovation Overperformer to Innovation Powerhouse
India now has 453 VC-backed deep science startups, 18 of them late-stage, after 117 percent growth since 2020. Laurus Labs, at USD 9.3 billion, is the most valuable deep science company in any middle-income economy outside China.
-
Navigating Energy Crossroads: S Jaishankar's Call For Diversified Supply Chains At G20 Ministerial Meeting
As geopolitical fault lines continue to test maritime trade routes and commodity flows, Jaishankar's message remains pertinent: true economic resilience requires open markets, protected transit lines, and a genuine commitment to multilateral cooperation rather than coercion.
-
Indians Are Travelling, But Not Every Journey Is A Holiday | The Week In Whys
Pilgrims, patients and working women are the real travellers, and the system hasn't quite caught up with them.
-
Getting To Work Costs Women More | The Reason Why
It is not just about women paying more than men. It is about women paying much more in cities than in villages.
-
AI Bias In Investing Cannot Be Eliminated, But It Can Be Governed
Framing is a particularly important example as identical financial information presented in terms of gains rather than losses can lead an LLM to reach a different assessment.
-
Joining The Dots | Dark Skies, Steady Diya: Why Hope Holds This Diwali
With war, a weak rupee and foreign outflows weighing on sentiment, policymakers at the NDTV World Summit and market veterans at NDTV Profit Ignite: Diwali Edition offered the same advice: stay invested and filter out the noise.
-
The Curious Case of Equitas Small Finance Bank And A CEO Who Quit For Stock
PN Vasudevan believes persistent investor concerns over a perceived conflict of interest had become a governance overhang on Equitas Small Finance Bank's stock, even as the lender improved profitability and asset quality.
-
Talking Points This Week: AI Cash Burn, A Tiger Comeback And An India That Still Finds Its Own Path
India is not immune to higher oil or tighter global liquidity, yet its earnings base is broader, its domestic policy levers are still available.
-
Foreign Investors Own Half Of HDFC Bank and ICICI Bank. An LTCG Cut Could Matter Most Here
Foreign portfolio investors have US$115 billion parked in HDFC Bank, ICICI Bank. If the government cuts long-term capital gains tax, Jefferies says returning foreign money could land here first.
