a bank transfer to PetroSaud’s account at one of the big Swiss banks in the amount of seven hundred million dollars. The sender’s name was partially blacked out, or redacted. Only the words “D. _____, Director of Investment Corporation of _____” were visible. In the section marked “Comments,” it read, “Purchase of Parcel 254A-D, Ras-al-Aliya, Saudi Arabia, Royal Saudi Oil Authority. Oil and Mineral Rights Exclusive.”
The second file showed the copy of another bank transfer, this one from the same PetroSaud account at the big Swiss bank, also in the amount of seven hundred million dollars, made that same day to a numbered account at the Bank of Liechtenstein.
The third file was a copy of the account documents for said numbered account at the Bank of Liechtenstein naming the account holder as the Private International Investment Holdings Corp., domiciled in the Netherlands Antilles and listing among its directors “____, director of the Investment Corporation of ____” and “____, finance minister of _____.” The missing words or names, again, redacted.
London didn’t need a road map. The money transferred to PetroSaud from the Investment Corporation of [country unknown] had not been used to purchase the oil lease in Saudi Arabia but instead had been sent to an account controlled by the person or persons who ran the Investment Corporation of [country unknown], one of whom was also the finance minister of that country.
As R had stated in his letter, executives at PetroSaud had worked with the managers of a sovereign wealth fund to defraud it of seven hundred million dollars.
London printed the files and laid them on her desk. Her head began to throb, demanding its daily dose of caffeine. She rose and walked to the kitchen—ten steps—and put a pod in her Keurig. Her apartment was small, but it was her own. Nine hundred square feet. One bedroom, one and a half baths, the “half” so tiny it made a coffin feel spacious, and an alcove she used as an office. The price was two million Singapore dollars. She would be paying off her mortgage until her grandchildren graduated from high school. On the plus side, she did have a view of the sea, if, that is, she walked to the far end of her terrace, stood on her tiptoes, and craned her neck.
The FT had suffered the same fate as newspapers everywhere. Readership had declined drastically over the past ten years. Bankruptcy was knocking at the door. To stay alive, management was making a push into the digital arena, publishing an online lifestyle magazine, producing short films, and posting stories on social media outlets the world over. Anything to generate revenue.
London’s style of investigative reporting was perilously out of date. She took too much time to produce a story, filled in too many rows on her expense reports. Often months passed without a byline. Her publisher had grown tired of paying her while he waited.
She’d had offers to work in television, but that was even worse. Quicker turnarounds, less fact-checking, and one producer’s advice to keep the top three buttons of her shirt undone and get a spray tan. And, oh, she might want to consider a push-up bra…
Last week her publisher had drawn a line in the sand. A story—and a good one, at that—or she was out. One more Fleet Street casualty. It was with a fervor born of survival that she attacked the story of R’s anonymous leak.
London drank her coffee, then returned to her desk. Her cat, Freddy—for Frédéric Chopin—rubbed himself against her leg, and she placed him on her lap, stroking his back as she reread the printouts. It was like a game. R had given her a few clues to get started, not many, but with her expertise, enough to deduce who he was talking about. She just had to dig.
She logged on to the FT’s proprietary database and searched for a list of Asian sovereign wealth funds. There were twelve funds with assets over five billion dollars, the biggest owned by Japan, with a value over one trillion dollars. She ruled out Japan. Too many eyes. Too many cooks in the kitchen. Similarly, she ruled out China. This was the work of a smaller fund, one overseen by a precious few. A monarchy, maybe. Probably not a liberal democracy. Then again…
She decided on Singapore, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Taiwan (as cunning a people as she’d come across), Brunei, and Vietnam.
Sovereign wealth funds were simply investment funds where the money in play came from the