Goldman Sachs Cuts Pay as Revenue Drops to Lowest Since 2005

[marmar]

(Bloomberg) Goldman Sachs Group Inc. (GS), the fifth- biggest U.S. bank by assets, cut jobs and money to pay employees as first-half revenue dropped to the lowest since 2005.

Compensation, which includes salaries, benefits, bonuses and the expense of deferred pay awarded in prior years, fell 14 percent to $7.29 billion in the first six months of the year, the New York-based bank said today in a statement. Revenue in the same period dropped 14 percent to $16.6 billion.

Lloyd C. Blankfein, 57, has cut 1,000 jobs this year to counter the slowest first-half since before he became chairman and chief executive officer in mid-2006. Trading, which contributed about 60 percent of the bank’s revenue in 2011, dropped 6 percent in the first half from a year earlier. Blankfein said last month he thinks the slowdown is a temporary reaction to the financial crisis.

The first-half compensation expense, at 44 percent of revenue, is enough to pay each of Goldman Sachs’s 32,300 employees $225,789 for the first six months of the year. The firm set aside $8.44 billion a year earlier, which was 44 percent of revenue and equal to an average $237,662 for each of the 35,500 people employed by Goldman Sachs at the time. .................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-07-17/goldman-sachs-cuts-pay-as-revenue-drops-to-lowest-since-2005.html

[cliffordu]

1. Bummer.