Goldman Sachs is burying the diversity metrics of its newest partner class — blaming a changed legal environment as it swells its elite ranks to a 16-year high to fight off defections.
The Wall Street giant led by CEO David Solomon tapped 109 employees on Thursday to join its partnership on Jan. 1, marking the largest promotion cycle since 2010.
As many as 30% of the new class hails from the asset and wealth management division, signaling Goldman’s pivot toward steady fees. A record 13 engineers made partner as the financial giant integrates artificial intelligence across the trading floors.
But in a stark departure from recent years, Goldman refused to provide a racial or gender breakdown of the newly minted rainmakers.
During a background briefing with reporters, executives dodged questions about the missing demographic data, citing the changed legal environment across corporate America.
The comments appeared to be a thinly-veiled reference to the Trump administration’s drive to stamp out so-called Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion policies nationwide.
Internally, bosses have said aiming to build a diverse workforce makes Goldman a better company.
In its previous class announced two years ago, Goldman named 95 new partners. Among them, 27% were women, 6% were Hispanic or Latino and 4% were Black.
The public pivot abruptly ends Goldman’s long-running DEI victory laps and exposes Wall Street’s growing fear of reverse-discrimination lawsuits following the Supreme Court’s crackdown on affirmative action.
While guarding the exact makeup of the 2026 class, the bank disclosed one metric, noting it will cross a milestone of more than 100 female partners out of a total pool of just over 500. Goldman currently employs more than 47,000 worldwide.
Asked by The Post if the supersized class was a desperate maneuver to prevent top earners from jumping to private equity rivals like Apollo and Blackstone, a Goldman executive insisted the partnership hasn’t “lost its luster.”
The bank pointed out that firm revenues have jumped roughly 60% since 2018, keeping the overall percentage of partners at roughly 1% of the workforce.
John Waldron, the chief operating officer and president, was in talks in 2024 to join Marc Rowan’s Apollo, but stayed at 200 West Street after being handed a $80 million stock retention bonus by the board in January 2025.
Waldron is seen as the heir apparent when Solomon finally calls it a day as CEO.
The firm’s newly minted rainmakers can nab yearly salaries north of $1 million, but the staggering wealth of the partnership lies in its secretive, closely guarded bonus pools.
Making the cut grants immediate entry into exclusive, performance-based year-end payout structures that routinely double or triple a partner’s base pay in a good market.
The partner title also unlocks access to Goldman’s proprietary internal investment vehicles, allowing them to personally co-invest their wealth alongside the firm in highly lucrative private equity funds while dodging steep client fees.
Goldman noted 39% of the new class joined as campus hires and 28% started as summer interns.
The incoming partners average 17 years at the bank and hold 20 different citizenships. Sixty-two are based in the Americas, 27 in EMEA, and 20 in the Asia Pacific region.