Deloitte Resigns as 1MDB Auditor

The departure of a third auditor for a Malaysian government investment fund is putting focus on another global company that apparently failed to raise questions about what investigators are calling a large-scale fraud. The fund, 1Malaysia Development Bhd. or 1MDB, said Tuesday that its auditor, Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu Ltd., resigned in February. Earlier disputes over the fund’s accounts led to the firing of 1MDB’s previous auditors, KPMG and Ernst & Young, according to a Malaysian auditor general’s report last year. The fund also said its 2013 and 2014 financial statements, which were audited by Deloitte, should no longer be relied on. Deloitte joins a long list of financial firms that have worked with 1MDB without identifying the alleged fraud there. These include Goldman Sachs Group, Swiss private banks Falcon Private Bank Ltd. and BSI SA, and other banks such as DBS Bank Ltd, Standard Chartered PLC and UBS Group AG. All have said they were unaware of the alleged fraud at 1MDB, though investigators have said they could have done more to spot it.