A British national and his Malaysian wife, directors of an investment company, have been charged in connection with an online money laundering scheme involving millions of dollars.

Bryan John Marsden, 58, and Phan Sew Ken, 51, were charged in a court in Negeri Sembilan on Wednesday with receiving RM26.68 million ringgit through alleged illegal online deposit-taking, the state Bernama news agency said.

Marsden also faced separate charges in a Kuala Lumpur court in relation to RM7.02 million allegedly received illegally in the same scheme. All the offences allegedly took place between mid-2003 and mid-2005, reports said.

Probe a first of its kind

Bank Negara said the scheme, which lured 100,000 investors globally by offering a daily two percent return, was the first of its kind to be investigated, the New Straits Times reported.

The deposits were accepted in the form of investments, it said.

Phan and Marsden, who has been in Malaysia since 1997, could not post bail, which was set at one million ringgit each.

"I have lost everything. There is nothing to say at this stage," Marsden was quoted as saying in the Star newspaper.

If convicted, Marsden and Phan each face a maximum sentence of five years in jail or a five million ringgit fine or both, Bernama said.