Investment banking pertains to certain activities of a financial services company or a corporate division that engages in providing advisory-based services on financial transactions for clients, such as institutional investors, corporations, and governments. Traditionally associated with corporate finance, such a bank might assist in raising financial capital by underwriting or acting as the client's agent in the issuance of debt or equity securities. An investment bank may also assist companies involved in mergers and acquisitions (M&A) and provide ancillary services such as market making, trading of derivatives and equity securities, FICC services or research. Most investment banks maintain prime brokerage and asset management departments in conjunction with their investment research businesses. As an industry, it is broken up into the Bulge Bracket, Middle Market, and boutique market.
The Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. is an American multinational investment bank and financial services company. Founded in 1869, Goldman Sachs is headquartered in Lower Manhattan in New York City, with regional headquarters in many international financial centers. Goldman Sachs is the second largest investment bank in the world by revenue and is ranked 55th on the Fortune 500 list of the largest United States corporations by total revenue. In Forbes Global 2000 2023, Goldman Sachs ranked 34th. It is considered a systemically important financial institution by the Financial Stability Board.
Margaret Cushing Whitman is an American business executive, diplomat, and politician serving as the United States ambassador to Kenya since 2022. Whitman was president and chief executive officer (CEO) of eBay from 1998 to 2008. Afterwards, she became president and CEO of Hewlett Packard Enterprise from 2011 to 2015, during the company's major split. She then served as the CEO of Quibi from its launch in 2018 until its closure in 2020. A member of the Republican Party, she ran for governor of California but was defeated by former governor Jerry Brown in California's 2010 gubernatorial election. Whitman was a senior presidential campaign official for Republican Mitt Romney in both 2008 and 2012, although she supported Democrats Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden in the 2016 presidential election and the 2020 presidential election, respectively.
Henry "Hank" Merritt Paulson Jr. is an American investment banker and financier who served as the 74th United States Secretary of the Treasury from 2006 to 2009. Prior to his role in the Department of the Treasury, Paulson was the chairman and chief executive officer (CEO) of major investment bank Goldman Sachs.
Richard Severin Fuld Jr. is an American banker best known as the final chairman and chief executive officer of investment bank Lehman Brothers. Fuld held this position from 1 April 1994 after the firm's spinoff from American Express until 15 September 2008. Lehman Brothers filed for bankruptcy protection under Chapter 11 on September 15, 2008, and subsequently announced the sale of major operations to parties including Barclays Bank and Nomura Securities.
Gary David Cohn is an American businessman and philanthropist who served as the 11th Director of the National Economic Council and chief economic advisor to President Donald Trump from 2017 to 2018. He managed the administration's economic policy agenda. Before serving in the White House, Cohn was president and COO of Goldman Sachs, where he worked for more than 25 years. Cohn was appointed vice-chairman of IBM on January 5, 2021.
Lloyd Craig Blankfein is an American investment banker who has served as senior chairman of Goldman Sachs since 2019, and chairman and chief executive from 2006 until the end of 2018. Before leading Goldman Sachs, he was the company's president and chief operating officer (COO) from 2004 to 2006, serving under then-CEO Henry Paulson.
Abby Joseph Cohen is an American economist and financial analyst on Wall Street. She is a professor of business at Columbia Business School. In 2001 she was named one of the 30 most powerful women in America by Ladies Home Journal, and she has been named as Barron's 100 most influential women in finance every year since the list's inception. She worked at Goldman Sachs for many years, working as the firm's Chief Investment Strategist prior to March 2007 and then leader of its Global Markets Institute, before retiring from this role in 2017.
Peter Amory Weinberg is an American businessman. He spent almost twenty years of his career at Goldman Sachs before co-founding Perella Weinberg Partners with merger specialist, Joseph Perella in 2006. The firm provides M&A advisory and alternative asset management services. Weinberg is its chief executive officer and founding partner.
Suzanne Nora Johnson is an American corporate lawyer and executive. Until 2007, she was vice chairman of Goldman Sachs, chair of the Global Markets Institute, head of the firm's Global Investment Research Division, and a member of the firm's management committee.
James Christopher Flowers is an American private equity investor and investment manager focused on the financial services industry. He is a Managing Director and CEO of J.C. Flowers & Co., and a member of the firm's Management Committee.
Janet Tavakoli is the president of Tavakoli Structured Finance, Inc., a Chicago-based consulting firm. She has had three books published on credit derivatives, structured finance, and the 2008 global financial crisis.
Teresa Hillary Clarke, is a prominent American investment banker, entrepreneur, and expert on Africa. Her career has spanned a wide range, from being a managing director at Goldman Sachs to co-founding a scholarship and mentoring non-profit, Student Sponsorship Programme in South Africa. Over the last several years, she has funded and led Africa.com.
Circle is a peer-to-peer payments technology company that now manages stablecoin USDC, a cryptocurrency the value of which is pegged to the U.S. dollar. It was founded by Jeremy Allaire and Sean Neville in October 2013. Circle is headquartered in Boston, Massachusetts. USDC, the second largest stablecoin worldwide, is designed to hold at or near a stable price of $1. The majority of its stablecoin collateral is held in short-term U.S. government securities.
Kathy M. Matsui is a General Partner of Japan's first ESG-focused global venture capital fund, MPower Partners. She is a former vice chair and chief Japan strategist for global investment bank Goldman Sachs. She was born in California in 1965. She was credited by Shinzō Abe, prime minister of Japan, with having coined the term "womenomics". She is a TEDx speaker.
GreenSky, LLC is a financial technology company founded in 2006 based in Atlanta, Georgia. It provides technology to banks and merchants to make loans to consumers for home improvement, solar, healthcare and other purposes.
Ramon Martin Chavez is an American investment banker and entrepreneur. He is vice chairman and partner of Sixth Street Partners. Previously, he served in a variety of senior roles at Goldman Sachs, including chief information officer (2014–2017), chief financial officer, and global co-head of the firm's Securities Division. Marty was also a partner and member of Goldman's management committee. He was the chief technology officer and co-founder of Quorum Software Systems and CEO and co-founder of Kiodex. He is chairman of the board of computational pharmaceutical company Recursion, Board Observer of biotech company Earli and longevity biopharma company Cambrian Biopharma, and board member of Alphabet Inc.
David Michael Solomon is an American investment banker and the chief executive officer (CEO) of Goldman Sachs, a position he has held since October 2018. He has also been chairman of the bank since January 2019. Before assuming his role as CEO, Solomon was president and chief operating officer from January 2017 to September 2018, and was joint head of the investment banking division from July 2006 to December 2016. Solomon formally succeeded Lloyd Blankfein, the previous CEO, on October 1, 2018, and was named chairman after Blankfein's retirement.
Goldman Sachs, an investment bank, has been the subject of controversies. The company has been criticized for lack of ethical standards, working with dictatorial regimes, close relationships with the U.S. federal government via a "revolving door" of former employees, and driving up prices of commodities through futures speculation. It has also been criticized by its employees for 100-hour work weeks, high levels of employee dissatisfaction among first-year analysts, abusive treatment by superiors, a lack of mental health resources, and extremely high levels of stress in the workplace leading to physical discomfort.
Michael Dubno is an American inventor, computer scientist, explorer, and video game developer.
