By the late industrialist Enrique Zobel’s recollections, former strongman Ferdinand Marcos left behind his widow, Imelda, and three children with a cache of gold bars that in 1989 was worth at least $35 billion.

Zobel said Marcos, then weak and ailing, showed him original certificates of the gold bars worth $35 billion, then based on the prevailing price of $400 per ounce,