Separately, former Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak has been charged with three counts of money laundering linked to the 1MDB affair, reports said. He is accused of having received MYR42 million from the fund in his personal bank account. Since his fall from power in the 9 May national elections, it has been speculated that Najib Razak and others would face intensifying pressure from the new government.

The 1MDB saga has seen investigations kick off in Singapore, the US and Switzerland. An affair that has sometimes entered the realm of the surreal, the company that produced the blockbuster film The Wolf of Wall Street, and was co-founded by the stepson of Malaysia' of Najib Razak, a few weeks ago settled a lawsuit filed by the US government to seize assets allegedly acquired with money siphoned from iMDB. In that case, US prosecutors had alleged that Martin Scorsese's 2013 film was financed by Red Granite Pictures using funds stolen from the fund.

It is claimed that as much as $4.5 billion was misappropriated from 1MDB by high-level officials of the fund and their associates, according to the US Justice Department.

The investigation into how $4 billion disappeared from 1Malaysia Development Berhad, or 1MDB, has involved US attorneys’ offices in Los Angeles and New York, but the US Department of Justice gave control to federal prosecutors in Brooklyn who are “intensively focused” on Goldman’s role, the newswire said. The report originally appeared in the New York Times.

Goldman Sachs, which generated about $600 million in fees for its work with 1MDB, has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing and said it is fully cooperating with authorities, the report said.

The report quoted a spokesman saying that Goldman Sachs has disclosured 1MDB probes in a quarterly filing which said the bank has received subpoenas and information requests from a number of government bodies and regulators.

Brooklyn prosecutors are also considering criminal charges against former Goldman investment banker Tim Leissner, who worked closely with 1MDB, the the NYT report said.

Reports added that the DoJ declined to comment on the matter at the time of going to press.