According to a person familiar with the details, Goldman Sachs expects to lay off up to 8% of its employees as it braces for a harder market next year.
The layoffs will effect every section of the bank and will likely happen in January, according to the individual, who declined to be identified speaking about personnel decisions.
This comes ahead of a Goldman shareholder conference in which management is scheduled to present performance targets. The New York-based investment firm usually pays bonuses in January, so the layoffs could be a means to save bonus funds for remaining staff.
After a two-year boom in mergers and hiring, Wall Street is adjusting to a weaker revenue environment this year. Goldman Sachs was the first major corporation to lay off workers in September, with only a few hundred people affected. Citigroup followed suit with fairly modest decreases.
Goldman had been hiring previously: the firm had 49,100 employees as of September 30, up 14% from the previous year.
The move comes as Goldman Sachs and other investment banks report a significant reduction in fees related to initial public offerings and a bleak outlook for merger and acquisition advising in 2023 owing to economic uncertainty.