{"id":3594,"date":"2009-11-17T19:57:30","date_gmt":"2009-11-17T19:57:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/zmetro.com\/?p=3594"},"modified":"2009-11-17T19:57:30","modified_gmt":"2009-11-17T19:57:30","slug":"goldman_apologi","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.zmetro.com\/?p=3594","title":{"rendered":"Goldman apologises for role in crisis"},"content":{"rendered":"

Francesco Guerrera, Justin Baer and Tom Braithwaite <\/a>: <\/p>\n

Goldman Sachs apologised for its role in the financial crisis on Tuesday and pledged $500m over five years \u2013 or about 2.3 per cent of its estimated bonus and salary pool for 2009 \u2013 to help 10,000 US small businesses recover from the \u00adrecession.
\nThe moves come as the bank tries to defuse a political and public backlash over its plans to share billions of dollars among top dealmakers after rebounding sharply from the turmoil and earning record profits in the first nine months of the year.
\n


\nLloyd Blankfein, Goldman\u2019s chief executive, told a corporate conference in New York that the bank regretted taking part in the cheap credit boom that had fuelled the pre-crisis bubble. \u201cWe participated in things that were clearly wrong and have reason to regret,\u201d said Mr Blankfein. \u201cWe apologise.\u201d
\n


\nMr Blankfein also told the conference he wished he had not told the UK\u2019s Sunday Times newspaper that Goldman did \u201cGod\u2019s work\u201d \u2013 a remark that was seized upon by the bank\u2019s critics \u2013 and said it had been meant as a joke.
\n


\nMr Blankfein spoke hours before Goldman revealed plans to invest $500m over five years in business education, technical assistance and venture capital to help 10,000 small businesses across the US. The yearly amount of about $100m to be spent on the initiative \u2013 which will be overseen by a panel co-chaired by Warren Buffett, a Goldman investor \u2013 is equivalent to a good trading day at Goldman. In the third quarter, the bank had 36 days in which traders made more than $100m.
\n


\nMr Buffett told the Financial Times that the small business programme was not a response by the bank to recent criticism. \u201cThis is a big initiative,\u201d he said. \u201cThis is not a one-day or one-year wonder. It\u2019s a continuous programme.\u201d<\/i><\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Francesco Guerrera, Justin Baer and Tom Braithwaite <\/a>: <\/p>\n

Goldman Sachs apologised for its role in the financial crisis on Tuesday and pledged $500m over five years \u2013 or about 2.3 per cent of its estimated bonus and salary pool for 2009 \u2013 to help 10,000 US small businesses recover from the \u00adrecession.
\nThe moves come as the bank tries to defuse a political and public backlash over its plans to share billions of dollars among top dealmakers after rebounding sharply from the turmoil and earning record profits in the first nine months of the year.
\n


\nLloyd Blankfein, Goldman\u2019s chief executive, told a corporate conference in New York that the bank regretted taking part in the cheap credit boom that had fuelled the pre-crisis bubble. \u201cWe participated in things that were clearly wrong and have reason to regret,\u201d said Mr Blankfein. \u201cWe apologise.\u201d
\n


\nMr Blankfein also told the conference he wished he had not told the UK\u2019s Sunday Times newspaper that Goldman did \u201cGod\u2019s work\u201d \u2013 a remark that was seized upon by the bank\u2019s critics \u2013 and said it had been meant as a joke.
\n


\nMr Blankfein spoke hours before Goldman revealed plans to invest $500m over five years in business education, technical assistance and venture capital to help 10,000 small businesses across the US. The yearly amount of about $100m to be spent on the initiative \u2013 which will be overseen by a panel co-chaired by Warren Buffett, a Goldman investor \u2013 is equivalent to a good trading day at Goldman. In the third quarter, the bank had 36 days in which traders made more than $100m.
\n


\nMr Buffett told the Financial Times that the small business programme was not a response by the bank to recent criticism. \u201cThis is a big initiative,\u201d he said. \u201cThis is not a one-day or one-year wonder. It\u2019s a continuous programme.\u201d<\/i><\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,21,39,33,9,17],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.zmetro.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3594"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.zmetro.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.zmetro.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.zmetro.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.zmetro.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3594"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.zmetro.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3594\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.zmetro.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3594"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.zmetro.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3594"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.zmetro.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3594"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}