Goldman Sachs Considers Its Next CEO 

You may soon be able to catch another set by DJ D-Sol. 

Goldman Sachs’ board has been discussing disc-spinning CEO David Solomon stepping down and Chief Operating Officer John Waldron taking the reins around the end of next year or early 2028, The Wall Street Journal reported, citing people familiar with the matter. Waldron joined the bank at the turn of the century, about a year after Solomon. When Solomon took over as chief executive, he gave Waldron the firm’s second-most important job. 

Waldron has long been seen as Solomon’s successor; the firm even offered him $80 million last year to stick around. 

Sorry, Marcus 

While client assets in Goldman’s management division have climbed to $1.9 trillion, according to the most recent annual report, Solomon’s tenure hasn’t been without challenges. The bank faced a post-pandemic dealmaking slump, and Solomon himself faced wide criticism for his personal leadership approach (New York Magazine asked in a headline whether he was “too big a jerk” to run the firm).  He also gave up public DJ-ing after negative headlines, the Journal reported.

But by far the biggest misstep has been Goldman’s push into consumer banking. Under Solomon’s predecessor, the firm introduced high-interest accounts and loans in hopes of capturing the retail market. Solomon helped expand the consumer offerings, and the move backfired. In 2022, Goldman folded its digital consumer bank Marcus into its asset and wealth management business. In 2023, the bank disclosed $3 billion in losses related to that area of the business since the end of 2020. It also got dinged to the tune of $65 million by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) for mishandling customer disputes related to the consumer credit cards it issued in partnership with Apple. 

If Waldron does snag the top job, it’s fair to expect a continued shift away from the consumer market toward Goldman’s core offerings: 

• Waldron has held several positions in the firm’s investment banking arm, including co-head of leveraged finance and co-head of the investment banking division. He has worked closely with Solomon in recent years to reshape Goldman’s strategy, which is anchored in global banking, markets and asset management. 
• According to the Journal, Waldron has acted as a sounding board for Goldman leaders and partners who had doubts about which way the company was headed, including its foray into consumer lending. 

AI Everywhere: Like many of its peers, Goldman is going all in on automation, and Waldron is credited with creating its AI transformation initiative “OneGS 3.0,” according to Reuters. Earlier this year, he told CNBC that the firm is “a human assembly line” that will become more digitized.