Goldman Sachs To Cut 3,200 This Week

Goldman Sachs Group will start cutting thousands of jobs across the firm from Wednesday, two sources familiar with the move said, as it prepares for a tough economic environment in the year ahead, Saeed Azhar and Scott Murdoch reported for Reuters.

Photo Insert: The layoffs are likely to affect most major divisions of the banks but should center on Goldman Sachs' investment banking division.

The job cuts are expected to be just over 3,000, one of the sources said, but the final number is yet to be determined. Bloomberg News has reported that Goldman would eliminate about 3,200 positions.

Goldman had 49,100 employees at the end of the third quarter, after adding significant numbers of staff during the coronavirus pandemic.

The layoffs are likely to affect most major divisions of the banks but should center on Goldman Sachs' investment banking division, one of the sources said. Institutional banks have suffered a major slowdown in corporate dealmaking activity as a result of volatile global financial markets.

Hundreds of jobs are also likely to be reduced from Goldman Sachs' loss-making consumer business after it scaled back plans for its direct-to-consumer unit Marcus, the sources said.

The bank's chief executive David Solomon sent a year-end voice memo to staff warning of a headcount reduction in the first half of January, two separate sources said. Goldman Sachs declined comment on the memo.

The job cuts come ahead of the bank's annual bonus payments which are usually delivered later in January and are expected to be down about 40%.

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