The 34-year-old – whose former colleagues Yak Yew Chee and Yvonne Seah were also recently sentenced to imprisonment – was first arrested in March 2016 in connection to Singapore's largest money laundering probe into the 1Malaysia Development Berhad fund.

Former BSI wealth planner Yeo Jiawei, who last month was handed a 30-month jail sentence by a Singapore court over his connection to Malaysia's scandal-hit state-owned fund, reportedly used a tax haven company as part of an $8.2 million splurge on Australian property. 

The 34-year-old - whose former colleagues Yak Yew Chee and Yvonne Seah were also recently sentenced to imprisonment - was first arrested in March 2016 in connection to Singapore's largest money laundering probe into the 1Malaysia Development Berhad fund. The investment fund is currently the subject of money laundering investigations in at least six countries, including Switzerland, Singapore and the US.

Yeo's foray into the Australian property market began with a $1.3 million luxury oceanfront apartment in Surfers Paradise, which he bought in 2014 from a collapsed developer, according to Guardian Australia. The news service revealed that Yeo is a director of a Seychelles-registered company which then paid a further $6.9 million for commercial properties in Broadbeach, the tourist town's trendy dining precinct, a year later. 

Earlier this week, this news service reported that Australian Federal Police are now assisting with international investigations into whether money illegally taken from the 1MDB fund has been parked down under. It is not yet known whether the AFP is examining the properties linked to Yeo, however.

The court in the case involving Yeo heard that he had acquired $6 million of Australian property while allegedly playing a pivotal role in the illicit movement of $22.6 million of 1MDB funds when employed as a wealth manager at BSI Bank Singapore, which was last year forced to shut shop in Singapore by the city-state's financial regulator, the Monetary Authority of Singapore. A separate trial, where Yeo faces seven other charges including money laundering and cheating, is scheduled to begin in April. He has denied committing the offences.

Australian property records seen by Guardian Australia show that he paid $1.3 million in October 2014 for a fifth-floor apartment in the Soul building, the Gold Coast's second-tallest highrise, which overlooks Main Beach, situated at the heart of the Surfers Paradise tourist strip. 

Two months later a Seychelles-registered company called Connect Capital Global Investments, of which Yeo is a director, obtained an Australian business number and registered to pay goods and services tax, indicating a predicted annual income of $75,000 or more. Connect Capital registered in the Seychelles with the help of Offshore Incorporations, a rival of Mossack Fonseca, the company at the epicentre of the Panama Papers scandal that led to a mass exposure of the secretive world of tax havens.

In October 2015, Connect Capital paid $2.4 million for four retail premises in the ground floor of a building in Broadbeach. Two months later, the company shelled out nearly $3.4 million for another two retail premises nearby and four days later spent just over $1 million on a neigbouring shopfront in the same building, leased to a doughnut business which pays more than $63,000 annually in rent. 

A spokesperson for Australian Taxation Accounts reportedly said the company had no idea of Yeo's illicit conduct, adding that it was a “shock” to hear of his conviction and further charges. 

The Malaysian government is reportedly making preparations to close 1MDB under a plan spearheaded by a prominent government unit called the Budiman committee.