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Because GS has never been about having a "brain trust". It is about proximity to power. That peaked in 1998 when Time magazine ran the "Committee to Save the

Because GS has never been about having a "brain trust". It is about proximity to power. That peaked in 1998 when Time magazine ran the "Committee to Save the World" cover, featuring Bob Rubin, Larry Summers, and Alan Greenspan. To this day, people talk about that cover.

jmeister 6y ago
This is nonsense. GS has always had among the best talent on Wall St. In modeling and software they’ve been a step ahead of everyone else. An extreme example: Fisher Black, a Nobel winning economist, used to work there in the early 90s. And talent is not even the most distinguishing factor: it’s culture. Their culture is held to be the gold standard in corporate America, if you step outside the FANG bubble.
- rmrfstar 6y ago
  (1) Black-Litterman is literally the only useful thing to come out of GS ever. (2) LTCM employed a Nobel winning economist too. Was that "brain trust" the source of PnL, or was it cheap leverage? Fun fact on LTCM and GS and 1998: according to Lowenstein's account, the GS banker who came to diligence LTCM during the fed-forced bailout was seen furtively reviewing a laptop in a corner. The next day, all the positions recorded in that laptop moved sharply against LTCM... surely this was a coincidence. Great culture they have over there at Vampire Squid, Inc.
- phyalow 6y ago
  Cant say I agree. I worked for various European and US IB's pre 08, then have for the better part of the last decade been a client of them. IMO GS's culture has always struck me as a lot of self anointed hubris and resembles attitudes found on /r/iamverysmart, which when viewed from the outside it makes one laugh. All US IB's these days are largely just commodity balance sheets. None of them have any tangible edge over each other in the bigger picture.
  - Aeolun 6y ago
    > IMO GS's culture has always struck me as a lot of self anointed hubris and resembles attitudes found on /r/iamverysmart Having gone to a GS recruitment event, that was basically what I came away with. I’m sure they’re doing technically interesting things, but I honestly cannot sort it from the bullshit.
  - erpellan 6y ago
    I've worked with several ex-GS people, all of whom were convinced they were the smartest person in the room, none of whom were even close. Some of the 'GS do it this way' ideas were so terrible we wondered if part of Goldman's strategy was to seed their competition with them as part of a sabotage effort.
    - JackFr 6y ago
      I’ve made the same observation. The point is, though, if they were any good they wouldn’t be ex-GS people.
  - koheripbal 6y ago
    ...and yet it was always extremely difficult to get a job there, and they paid the best. ...that's literally how you attract the best talent. ...so you, they were arrogant. Maybe some portion of that was earned?
    - lonelappde 6y ago
      They were talented but the talents were theft, fraud, and self-dealing, not capital allocation.
    - phyalow 6y ago
      I can assure you not much in high finance is "earned".
  - carlsborg 6y ago
    If you didn’t work there you didn’t see how the machine works. It was genuinely world class: they’re pulling right from the top to make you the best you can be, and the best get rewarded.
- carlsborg 6y ago
  True, the culture at GS is/was by far the best.
  - valuearb 6y ago
    Did you mean to type “most corrupt” instead?
markus_zhang 6y ago
But finance is always about connections, said Michele Sindona.
- dredmorbius 6y ago
  Context? Michele Sindona (Italian: [miˈkɛːle sinˈdoːna]; May 8, 1920 – March 22, 1986) was an Italian banker and convicted felon. Known in banking circles as "The Shark", Sindona was a member of Propaganda Due (#0501),[1] a secret lodge of Italian Freemasonry, and had clear connections to the Sicilian Mafia. He was fatally poisoned in prison while serving a life sentence for the murder of lawyer Giorgio Ambrosoli. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michele_Sindona https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michele_Sindona
ineedasername 6y ago
Maybe the big names at Goldman aren't as big as they had been in 1998, but it's all still just a collection collection of social connections and who knows who and inroads into various power structures. And that's not just Goldman, that's banking and finance at a high level writ large.
- eurasiantiger 6y ago
  It’s amazing how far a few kilos of cocaine will get one in those circles. Maybe the prohibition needs to be repealed to prevent cartels from running the markets.
lonelappde 6y ago
As far as I can tell, only one of those people (Rubin) was substantially GS affiliated. Still, pretty bad.
swypych 6y ago
http://content.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,2054093,00.html http://content.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,2054093,00... For the lazy

jmeister 6y ago

This is nonsense. GS has always had among the best talent on Wall St. In modeling and software they’ve been a step ahead of everyone else. An extreme example: Fisher Black, a Nobel winning economist, used to work there in the early 90s. And talent is not even the most distinguishing factor: it’s culture. Their culture is held to be the gold standard in corporate America, if you step outside the FANG bubble.

rmrfstar 6y ago
(1) Black-Litterman is literally the only useful thing to come out of GS ever. (2) LTCM employed a Nobel winning economist too. Was that "brain trust" the source of PnL, or was it cheap leverage? Fun fact on LTCM and GS and 1998: according to Lowenstein's account, the GS banker who came to diligence LTCM during the fed-forced bailout was seen furtively reviewing a laptop in a corner. The next day, all the positions recorded in that laptop moved sharply against LTCM... surely this was a coincidence. Great culture they have over there at Vampire Squid, Inc.
phyalow 6y ago
Cant say I agree. I worked for various European and US IB's pre 08, then have for the better part of the last decade been a client of them. IMO GS's culture has always struck me as a lot of self anointed hubris and resembles attitudes found on /r/iamverysmart, which when viewed from the outside it makes one laugh. All US IB's these days are largely just commodity balance sheets. None of them have any tangible edge over each other in the bigger picture.
- Aeolun 6y ago
  > IMO GS's culture has always struck me as a lot of self anointed hubris and resembles attitudes found on /r/iamverysmart Having gone to a GS recruitment event, that was basically what I came away with. I’m sure they’re doing technically interesting things, but I honestly cannot sort it from the bullshit.
- erpellan 6y ago
  I've worked with several ex-GS people, all of whom were convinced they were the smartest person in the room, none of whom were even close. Some of the 'GS do it this way' ideas were so terrible we wondered if part of Goldman's strategy was to seed their competition with them as part of a sabotage effort.
  - JackFr 6y ago
    I’ve made the same observation. The point is, though, if they were any good they wouldn’t be ex-GS people.
- koheripbal 6y ago
  ...and yet it was always extremely difficult to get a job there, and they paid the best. ...that's literally how you attract the best talent. ...so you, they were arrogant. Maybe some portion of that was earned?
  - lonelappde 6y ago
    They were talented but the talents were theft, fraud, and self-dealing, not capital allocation.
  - phyalow 6y ago
    I can assure you not much in high finance is "earned".
- carlsborg 6y ago
  If you didn’t work there you didn’t see how the machine works. It was genuinely world class: they’re pulling right from the top to make you the best you can be, and the best get rewarded.
carlsborg 6y ago
True, the culture at GS is/was by far the best.
- valuearb 6y ago
  Did you mean to type “most corrupt” instead?

markus_zhang 6y ago

But finance is always about connections, said Michele Sindona.

dredmorbius 6y ago
Context? Michele Sindona (Italian: [miˈkɛːle sinˈdoːna]; May 8, 1920 – March 22, 1986) was an Italian banker and convicted felon. Known in banking circles as "The Shark", Sindona was a member of Propaganda Due (#0501),[1] a secret lodge of Italian Freemasonry, and had clear connections to the Sicilian Mafia. He was fatally poisoned in prison while serving a life sentence for the murder of lawyer Giorgio Ambrosoli. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michele_Sindona https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michele_Sindona

ineedasername 6y ago

Maybe the big names at Goldman aren't as big as they had been in 1998, but it's all still just a collection collection of social connections and who knows who and inroads into various power structures. And that's not just Goldman, that's banking and finance at a high level writ large.

eurasiantiger 6y ago
It’s amazing how far a few kilos of cocaine will get one in those circles. Maybe the prohibition needs to be repealed to prevent cartels from running the markets.

lonelappde 6y ago

As far as I can tell, only one of those people (Rubin) was substantially GS affiliated. Still, pretty bad.

swypych 6y ago

http://content.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,2054093,00.html http://content.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,2054093,00... For the lazy