Goldman Sachs & Co.

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Goldman Sachs Group, Inc.

Founded	1869
Headquarters	New York, NY
Key People	Chairman and CEO Lloyd C. Blankfein
Products	brokerage, investment banking, asset management,
Web site	http://www2.goldmansachs.com/]

Goldman Sachs (GS) is one of the world's largest investment banks and trading houses and a long-standing member of Wall Street's so-called "bulge bracket" of securities-industry powerhouses that includes arch-rivals Morgan Stanley, Merrill Lynch and JPMorgan Chase & Co.. Like many competitors, GS suffered from the sub-prime mortgage meltdown in 2007 and has recently taken some financial hits, including its first quarter 2008 results.

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1 Brief History
- 1.1 Recent Problems
2 Key People
3 References

Brief History

Goldman Sachs was founded in 1869 by German immigrant Marcus Goldman when he opened a commercial-paper business on New York City's Pine Street.^[1] It began to restructure in 1989 when the Goldman Sachs Group, LP was formed to serve as the GS parent company and in 1996 the Goldman Sachs Corporation, owned by a partnership of GS's managing directors, became the Group's sole general partner.^[2]

Since then Goldman Sachs has continued to grow its earnings and posted solid year-on-year increases in total net revenues and earnings per share in the 2005-2007 financial period.^[3] Total net revenues jumped more than $10 billion from 2006 to just under $46 billion in 2007 while earnings per share (EPS) rose from $19.69 to $24.73 over the same period, as investment markets prospered.

Recent Problems

But Goldman Sachs took a big hit in the first quarter of 2008, particularly on investment banking revenue, after mortgage and credit markets slumped worldwide in 2007. Its first-quarter '08 profit dropped 53% to $1.47 billion, with losses of $1 billion in mortgages and securities and another $1 billion in credit markets.^[4] Goldman Sachs's profit per share for Q1 dropped from $6.67 a year ago to $3.23 in 2008. The figures nonetheless beat Wall Street expectations and the GS share price rose in response.

Key People

Chairman and CEO Lloyd C. Blankfein^[5] was appointed to both positions at Goldman Sachs in June 2006 after a two-year stint as Goldman Sachs' President and Chief Operating Officer. He had been co-head of GS's Fixed Income, Currency and Commodities (FICC) division from its inception in 1997 until 2003, when he became its head, and also served as Vice Chairman of Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. from 2002 to 2004. In fiscal 2007 Blankfein's salary package from GS totalled $27,585, 474, including $26,985,474 in bonuses, BusinessWeek reports.^[6] By contrast, Bank of America Chairman and CEO Kenneth D. Lewis pulled down $1.5 million in fiscal 2007 while Morgan Stanley Chairman and CEO John Mack made $800,000, although Blankfein's official salary is listed at $600,000 annually.