Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein: Retirement speculation wishful thinking
Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein threw more cold water on a report that he’s preparing to step down as head of the investment bank as early as this year.
Blankfein, speaking at an event in Boston on Thursday, said it is “very hard to leave these jobs.”
“The Wall Street Journal reported [my retirement], which is more of a wishful thought than anything,” he said, according to Reuters. “[The story] wasn’t right, but it may not be wrong forever.”
The Wall Street Journal reported in early March that Blankfein is nearing the end of a 12-year run at the helm of Goldman Sachs, one of the world’s most profitable investment banks. Blankfein could leave his post as soon as the end of the year, according to the report. The company’s two co-presidents, Harvey Schwartz and David Solomon, were named as potential successors, but Schwartz recently announced plans to retire.
Blankfein is “firmly in control of his exit,” the report added, citing sources familiar with the matter.
In a Twitter missive sent soon after the report was published, Blankfein joked that he felt like “Huck Finn listening to his own eulogy.”
“It’s the [Wall Street Journal’s] announcement,” he wrote, “not mine.”