The world of DJs loses, if not its greatest figure, yes one of the wealthiest, D Sol, the stage name of David Solomon, who has earned 119 million dollars (113 million euros) in the last four years , figures around those of David Guetta or Tiësto. Of course, Solomon didn’t earn his income from festivals or raves, but from something more prosaic: running the Wall Street giant Goldman Sachs. So his departure from the techno scene is, more than anything, to get deeper into the Wall Street scene.
It is a decision that institutional investors, who control 69.17% of Goldman’s capital, had been demanding of him practically since he became president and CEO of the bank in 2019, and that had practically become a demand for as his management of the entity frustrated shareholders and allowed the bank’s eternal rival, Morgan Stanley, to take advantage.
The highlight has been the results of the third quarter, which have shown a drop in profit by a third, and which adds to the departure of a series of senior managers of the entity and the growing doubts about the bank’s strategy. The need to strengthen the lobby in the face of the possibility of imposing stricter banking regulation known as Basel 3, the fall in income from the wealth management activity and the failure of its entry into retail banking explain the reasons that have that Solomon leaves, at least for now, the mixing desk.
Many of Goldman’s problems are not unique to that financial institution. This is a problematic year for investment banking, due to rising interest rates, the fallout from the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank in March, and the tightening of the regulatory environment. However, the large American financial entities – JP Morgan, Bank of America, Wells Fargo, Citigroup, Morgan Stanley and Goldman itself – have presented results in the second quarter that were higher than those expected by the market.
But Goldman Sachs has a problem of its own, which is its entry into the retail banking sector, begun by Solomon’s predecessor, Lloyd Blankfein – who is still honorary president of the bank – and continued by him. The strategy has proven to be much less successful than planned, and the bank has decided to exit that segment at the cost of considerable losses. Last week, Goldman sold its Bluesky subsidiary, which specializes in offering loans for home renovations, solar panel installations, and health plans with losses of 73% compared to what it paid for it just a year and a half ago.
Goldman has also shed most of its personal credit, and is now trying to unwind its two biggest alliances in retail banking: the credit card with General Motors and the credit card and savings account with Apple, which offers an annual return of 4.15%.
This situation has caused the main shareholders of Goldman Sachs to invite Solomon to put D Sol to rest and focus on the bank, not so much, according to the American press, because of the distraction that his activity as a DJ represented but because of the problem of image and reputation that it represented at a time when the bank is going through a reformulation of its strategy.
In fact, the pressure had been on for some time. It had been years since D Sol had gone down in History, replaced by the more sober David Solomon, who in turn stopped performing at public events more than a year ago, since he said goodbye to the stages at the festival in July 2022. Lollapalooza, in Chicago. This has translated into his decline in popularity on the streaming website Spotify, where David Solomon has gone from having 550,000 followers to 350,000.