WASHINGTON — The disgraced former chief executive of failed investment bank MF Global told Congress on Thursday, in testimony compelled under subpoena, that he has no idea where a missing $1.2 billion went and insisted that he never instructed anyone to misuse customer funds.
Jon Corzine defied expectations that he would appear before the House Agriculture Committee and plead his Fifth Amendment rights against self-incrimination. Instead, the former Democratic U.S. senator and governor of New Jersey offered a humble apology to MF Global’s investors and employees.
“Their plight weighs on my mind every day — every hour. And as the chief executive officer of MF Global at the time of its bankruptcy, I apologize to all those affected,” Corzine said.
Corzine’s whereabouts had been a mystery for weeks after his abrupt Nov. 3 resignation days after his financial firm filed for bankruptcy. Rumors have swirled, fueled by $1.2 billion that’s missing and allegations that MF Global misused customer money in a last-ditch effort to stay afloat.
Pressed on that missing money, Corzine said his initial reaction to the news, shortly before an Oct. 30 bankruptcy filing, was “stunned disbelief that this could be the case, when many hundreds of millions are believed to be missing.”
Most lawmakers’ questions centered on whether customer money was commingled with the bank’s money in an effort to stay afloat. A humbled Corzine said that if that happened, it wasn’t directed by him.
“There was never any directed attempt to commingle those funds,” he said.
