The decision was presumably made after hearing about former Goldman Sachs board member, Rajat Gupta, calling up Raj Rajaratnam with earnings information 23 seconds after getting it from GS management. NOBODY PLAYS LLOYD LIKE THAT! Read more »
Lloyd Blankfein
Men too! According to Fortune‘s annual ranking of the “50 most admired companies,” Blankfein’s Goldman is 25 overall (the top 50 also includes JPMorgan and Wells Fargo) and number one out of the “megabanks.” In that category, here’s how the rest stacked up:
16. Royal Bank of Scotland
15. Mizuho Financial Group
14. Citigroup
13. Bank of America
12. Sumiomo Mitsui Financial Group
11. Unicredit Group
10. BNP Paribas
9. Deutsche Bank
7. UBS
7. Morgan Stanley
6. Barclays Read more »
Lloyd? Jamie? Gorman? Vikram loves a good beat, how about him? Read more »
Former Congressional Aide Has An Idea That Incorporates Sexual Assualt For How To Stop “All The Bullshit” On Wall Street
By Bess Levin
Wherever there's a threat of sexual violence, there I'll be.
His plan is fairly simple: “put Lloyd Blankfein in pound-me-in-the-ass prison.” Read more »
This is probably not something Lloyd wanted to hear today but he’s going to have to get used to it: Bill Simmons has apparently hired away the amazing Katie Baker, who’s been with Goldman Sachs for the last six years, most recently as a VP, for his new project. Sorry, LB. You knew this day was coming, but you probably imagined it’d be Jamie doing the poaching. [Deadspin]
Kenneth Feinberg Is Happy To Report Lloyd Blankfein Acted Like He Had To Care What The Government Thought When It Came To Executive Comp
By Bess Levin
In June 2009, as you may remember, Kenneth Feinberg was knighted Compensation Cop and given the authority to get involved in the payouts made to executives of 7 firms that received taxpayer bailouts. They included the biggest fuck-ups, who’d it’s be really bad to see generously compensating their top employees, like Citigroup, Bank of America, AIG. Goldman Sachs was not one of the companies required to get Feinberg’s approval on packages, but with the sensation of what it felt like to be strung up by the balls fresh in his mind, Lloyd Blankfein thought it’d be prudent to give the Comp Cop a buzz anyway, in a move that may surprise those who were previously under the impression Goldman didn’t answer to anyone. Read more »
As previously mentioned, yesterday on Twitter, Charlie Gasparino noted that several hours before the Super Bowl, at a party in Dallas, he “made eye contact” with Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein, who saw him and then proceeded to “walk the other way.” Then today on Facebook he implored people to help him figure out “what this means.” Read more »
Sharon Sinaswee, the 42-year-old founder of Armada Building Services, a small janitorial company in East Harlem, was a member of the first class of an entrepreneurship program sponsored by Goldman called 10,000 Small Businesses. It was time for execs from the investment bank to read participants’ business plans. She’d been paired with Blankfein. They spent an hour together as the Wall Street titan grilled her about her business. Among his tips: Sinaswee should cultivate a large pool of freelance handymen to tap at peak times. “He said I was on the right track,” said Sinaswee, who recently added two employees to her four-person staff and scored a contract from the city’s Department of Education. [NYDN]
Lloyd’s base salary has been raised from $600,000 to $2 million, according to the firm’s latest filing. Wingman Gary Cohn got bumped from $600,000 to $1.85 million.
In Era Of The Pitchforks, Goldman Sachs Employees Wanted To Give The Ignorant Twits Of The World A Piece Of Their Mind
By Bess Levin
When asked by Fortune why people could possibly want to work at Goldman Sachs, which doesn’t have a free cafeteria like Google or a super nice gym or compensation wildly better than those of some other Wall Street firms, one employee defensively answered, “People on the outside are not aware of the feeling…The sense of family and belonging that comes from working here is like none other.” People, it seems, just don’t get what it’s like to work at a place where you feel safe and warm. Where you can go to Lloyd Blankfein if you’re in trouble. Where everyone’s got your back. And where you have theirs. Meaning you would do anything for them. And by anything, we mean an-y-thing. And not just the standard getting rid of hookers stuff but, just, as an example, putting a cap in the ass of a guy who cut them in line at the movie theater and then suggested they were to blame for the near-collapse of the economy. Which is what some GS employees have been wanting to do for a while, and would’ve if Papa Blankfein hadn’t held them back. Read more »
Disgruntled Goldman Sachs Investor Jim Clark’s Bloomberg Therapy Session Offers Insight Into Why People Stick With GSAM When It Treats ‘Em So Bad
By Bess Levin
Jim Clark and his wife, Kristy, who's probably also pretty steamed at GSAM
For the March issue of Bloomberg Markets magazine, reporter Richard Teitelbaum explores the riddle wrapped within the squid that is Goldman Sachs Asset Management. Specifically, why investors stick with GSAM when evidence suggests they should take their money and run (GS’s funds have “badly trailed their peers over the three, five and 10 year periods ended December 31st” and yet assets under management have nearly tripled since 2000, rising an annual rate of 11.8 percent). To tackle this question, you could analyze data, talk to experts, see a palm reader or poll large groups of people familiar with the matter. Or you could save yourself a lot of time and remember that the simplest explanation is most likely the right one. And the answer to this conundrum is not just simple but brief. It can be summed up in three words, in fact, or two if you count the hyphenated one just once: Brand-name whores. Read more »
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