The 10th and final distribution from a fund for victims of late Ponzi scheme king Bernie Madoff began Monday, the Justice Department said.

The latest payout of more than $131 million will go to more than 23,000 victims worldwide. When completed, the fund will have distributed more than $4.3 billion to more than 40,000 victims in nearly 130 countries, the DOJ said.

That amount represents nearly 94% of the estimated total losses from the fraud, the department said.

The final payout from the Madoff Victim Fund was announced some 16 years after Madoff’s fraud came to light.

“Today’s distribution represents an unprecedented completion of victim compensation from civil forfeiture claims related to the Madoff scheme,” said James Dennehy, Assistant Director in Charge of the FBI’s New York Field Office.

“These victims quietly entrusted Madoff with their investments, only to ultimately lose significant funds as a result of his selfish scheme,” Dennehy said.

Madoff, the head of Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities in New York, pleaded guilty in March 2009 to 11 felony charges in connection with what federal prosecutors said was the largest Ponzi scheme in the world.

Madoff was sentenced to 150 years in prison for the fraud, which spanned four decades and involved paying off clients with funds collected from other clients rather than, as he claimed, trading profits from investments.

He died in April 2021 at the age of 82 in a federal prison facility in North Carolina, nearly a year after his request for release was rejected due to a terminal kidney disease.

When Madoff’s fraud first became public knowledge, prosecutors estimated the total damage at $65 billion. But this estimate fell sharply after authorities deducted the amount of phantom investment profits and interest that Madoff’s clients were deceived into believing existed.

Most of the fund for Madoff’s victims, about $2.2 billion, came from a civil forfeiture of the estate of Jeffry Picower, a now-deceased Madoff investor, the DOJ said.

Another $1.7 billion came from it JPMorgan Chase under a deferred prosecution agreement with the DOJ in January 2014. JPMorgan Chase and its predecessor institutions served as the primary bank through which Madoff operated his scheme, the DOJ previously said.

The remainder of the victims’ fund came from a “civil forfeiture action against investor Carl Shapiro and his family, as well as civil and criminal forfeiture actions against Bernard L. Madoff, Peter B. Madoff and their co-conspirators,” the DOJ said Monday.

Natural gas futures prices rose sharply on Monday, hitting a new 52-week high following reports of a colder-than-usual temperature outlook for January.

February natural gas futures rose more than 15% during the session after an updated forecast released Sunday by The Weather Co. and Atmospheric G2 showed that the temperature forecast for next month is expected to be colder than average across the East, particularly from Florida to Maine Parts of the Great Lakes.

However, the west is expected to experience milder than average temperatures, according to the report. In particular, the Four Corners region – the area of ​​the United States consisting of the southwest corner of Colorado, the southeast corner of Utah, the northeast corner of Arizona and the northwest corner of New Mexico – is expected to be the furthest above average .

The report also said colder temperatures in the East could peak by the middle of the month and are likely to be “much further below average” compared to the full month forecast for the eastern U.S. However, it is still unclear how temperatures will affect the second half of January.

In a separate report, AccuWeather meteorologists said the colder air could create a “stormy pattern,” with areas experiencing “significant snow and ice” for a significant portion of the first half of the month. They added that the decline will begin in the middle and end of next week.

Again Capital’s John Kilduff said on CNBC’s “Squawk on the Street” on Monday that there could be a natural gas “freeze,” which could lead to disruptions in natural gas production flows.

“We’re talking about freezing polar vortex weather that caused this surge in natural gas this morning,” said the company’s founding partner.

Earlier in the session, February futures prices rose as much as 20%, reaching a high of $4.201 per thousand cubic feet. That’s the highest level since January 4, 2023, when prices were as high as $4,219 per thousand cubic feet.

The move in February futures comes as natural gas – used to heat homes – has posted big gains recently. Commodity prices are up nearly 9% last week and about 58% this year.

In the meantime, Brent crude oil futures rose 30 cents to $74.39 a barrel US West Texas Intermediate Crude oil rose 71 cents to $71.10 a barrel.

Accident investigators are trying to figure out what caused a Jeju Air plane to land on its belly without its landing gear down at Muan International Airport in South Korea, killing all but two of the 181 people on board as it burst into flames in the country’s worst aviation disaster emerged over decades.

South Korea’s incumbent President Choi Sang-mok ordered an emergency inspection of the country Boeing 737-800, the type of aircraft used on the fatal Jeju Air Flight 7C2216.

The Boeing 737-800 is one of the most widely used aircraft in the world and has a strong safety record. It is older than the Boeing 737 Max, which was involved in two fatal crashes in 2018 and 2019 that killed all 346 people aboard those flights. The 737 Max was grounded for almost two years.

There are nearly 4,400 737-800s in service worldwide, according to aviation data company Cirium. This means the model accounts for approximately 17% of the commercial passenger aircraft fleet in operation worldwide.

The average age of the global 737-800 fleet is 13 years, according to Cirium, and the last aircraft in the series were delivered about five years ago.

Jeju Air has taken delivery of the plane involved in this weekend’s crash in 2017. According to Flightradar24, it was previously operated by European budget airline Ryanair. The aircraft involved in the crash was approximately 15 years old.

Aerospace experts say it is unlikely that investigators will find a design problem with the long-haul aircraft.

“The idea that they would find a design flaw at this point is almost unthinkable,” said Richard Aboulafia, managing director of AeroDynamic Advisory, an aerospace consulting firm.

A full investigation could take more than a year, and the unusual incident has raised more questions than answers, such as why the landing gear wasn’t extended. Even in the event of a hydraulic malfunction, Boeing 737-800 pilots can manually eject the landing gear.

One theory is that a possible bird strike knocked out the engines.

“If this happened at the altitude they were at, they may not have had time to prepare emergency checklists,” said Jeff Guzzetti, a retired aviation safety investigator with the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board and the Federal Aviation Administration. He also said that if the plane had not hit a hard wall at the end of the runway, the accident would have been easier to survive.

The NTSB leads the US investigative team, which includes Boeing and the FAA because the aircraft was manufactured and certified in the United States.

According to international protocols, the country where the accident occurred will lead the entire investigation.

From British royalty to Hollywood stars, Jimmy Choo luxury shoes have been worn by countless celebrities on red carpets around the world.

Now Choo is helping the next generation of fashion designers follow in his footsteps by opening an online store that sells clothing and accessories made by students and graduates of his design program, the JCA London Fashion Academy.

“My father always said to me: If you have the knowledge and skills, if you pass on your heritage, then the younger generation can also have all the skills and knowledge,” he told CNBC. Choo was born in Malaysia, where his father taught him how to make shoes by hand.

Choo opened the academy in 2021 and offers students a bachelor’s or master’s degree in entrepreneurship in design and brand innovation – with business being a core part of the program.

“It’s very important … to help them start a business and see how they can sell,” Choo told CNBC.

Students learn about marketing and public relations and write business plans with the goal of starting their own “micro” fashion business upon graduation, according to a description on the academy’s website.

“Even the most talented fashion designers will fail if they don’t have business acumen,” Choo said in a press release.

The academy also opened a temporary physical location – the JCA Retail Gallery – on the ground floor of the upscale White City Living residential complex in west London, where the students’ collections were displayed and put up for sale last week.

“The idea behind the launch was to give (students) a platform to sell their work without having to pay the fees you would normally pay to rent a retail store and to give them the opportunity to to speak to the general public,” said Olivia Black, one of the academy’s graduates and co-curator of the JCA Retail Gallery. The retail space was donated to the academy by real estate company Berkeley Group.

Black said Choo gave feedback during the launch of her eponymous fashion label and advised her to develop the idea for her brand’s motif – an eagle. “He always says, focus on something that really makes the garment special,” Black said.

Sustainability is the focus for the students. Many of the garments were made from leftover or used fabrics, while some were modular with zippers or loops so that sleeves or pant legs could be added or removed for different occasions. Choo suggested that designers could use the leftovers from luxury clothing production to create more affordable pieces.

Last year, McKinsey predicted that generative artificial intelligence could contribute between $150 billion and $275 billion to fashion and luxury industry operating profits as early as 2026. What does Choo think about AI and its impact on the fashion industry? He said AI would be useful for student exercises or translating letters from Chinese, but cautioned against using it for everything.

“Because people can see – if you use AI, everything will come out the same,” he said. “You can use it as a guideline, but you can’t take it 100% and do everything. Otherwise you have lost your skills,” Choo said.

Choo studied at London’s Cordwainers shoe college in the early 1980s and made shoes for a show at London Fashion Week later that decade. Vogue magazine journalist Kate Phelan saw his designs and called him and said, “Jimmy… we want these shoes,” Choo told CNBC. The magazine featured his shoes for several pages, and Choo found a customer in Diana, Princess of Wales in the 1990s.

Choo sold his 50 percent stake in the eponymous footwear company when the company was valued at £21 million in 2001 The brand is now owned by Capri holdingswhich it bought in 2017 in a $1.35 billion deal.

Boeing Shares fell nearly 5% in premarket trading on Monday after South Korea ordered an inspection of all B737-800 planes, the model involved in a fatal Jeju Air crash over the weekend.

Acting President Choi Sang-mok called on the Transportation Ministry to conduct an emergency safety inspection of the country’s entire air operations system, while officials at the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport (MOLIT) said they would conduct a “comprehensive special inspection” of the B737-800 .”

New York-listed Boeing shares fell 4.7% in premarket trading before paring losses to trade 4% lower as of 6:10 a.m. ET.

The exact circumstances of the crash, which killed 179 of 181 people, are uncertain on board the flight on Sunday. The plane landed at South Korea’s Muan International Airport without proper equipment, skidded off the runway and crashed into an outside wall before bursting into flames. The survivors were two crew members who were rescued from the rubble.

In a briefing on Monday, MOLIT said the plane’s pilot mentioned a “bird strike” minutes after the airport’s control tower issued a bird activity alert. The pilot also notified the control tower of a “go-around,” indicating an aborted landing attempt, and declared “mayday,” said Yu Kyung-soo, director of aviation safety policy at MOLIT, according to an NBC News translation.

Two black boxes were recovered from the aircraft and sent for analysis. The U.S. National Transportation Safety Board is now leading a team of American investigators, including the Federal Aviation Administration and Boeing, to help South Korea’s Aviation and Railway Accident Investigation Board investigate the crash.

MOLIT officials said Monday they were examining the concrete wall the plane crashed into for a link to the accident.

They also said they would conduct a “comprehensive special inspection of the B737-800 model.”

Boeing’s popular narrow-body aircraft has been in service for nearly three decades, with development predating the US manufacturer’s troubled B737 Max jets, a later version of the model.

The B737-800 is widely used by South Korean budget airlines, MOLIT said on Monday, with Jeju Air being the largest operator with 39 jets. Other operators include T’way Air, Jin Air, Eastar Jet and Air Incheon, while Korean Air operates two of these models.

“We will check compliance with various regulations, including operational records, inspections and maintenance before and after flights,” Ju Jong-wan, director of the Aviation Policy Office at MOLIT, said on Monday, according to NBC News translation.

“We plan to review stricter regulations regarding bird strikes, which have been identified as a potential cause of accidents, particularly for new airports under construction.”

CNBC has reached out to Boeing for comment.

Local media reported that another Jeju Air plane of the same model returned to South Korea’s Gimpo Airport shortly after takeoff on Monday after reporting problems with its landing gear.

At a news conference on Sunday, Song Kyung-hoon, head of Jeju Air’s management support office, said the airline would support the victims and their families and that the plane would be covered by $1 billion in insurance, according to the Yonhap news site. dollar is hedged.

Song also denied that mechanical failures or inadequate safety precautions played a role in the crash.

“This crash is not about maintenance issues. There can be absolutely no compromise when it comes to aircraft maintenance,” Song said.

Jeju Air shares hit an all-time low on Monday, closing 8.65% lower, according to FactSet data.

— CNBC’s Yeo Boon Ping contributed to this story.