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Lloyd Blankfein

Report: Goldman CEO Blankfein Hires High-Profile Defense Attorney

Ryan J. Reilly | August 22, 2011, 5:15PM

Lloyd Blankfein, Chairman and CEO of Goldman Sachs & Co.

Goldman Sachs Chief Executive Lloyd Blankfein has hired high-profile D.C. defense attorney Reid Weingarten as federal officials continue investigating Goldman's role in the financial crisis, Reuters reports.

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Topics: Goldman Sachs, Lloyd Blankfein

Goldman Sachs

Buffett Continues Defense Of Goldman: I Want Lloyd Blankfein To Stay Put (VIDEO)

Ben Frumin | May 3, 2010, 10:55AM

Warren Buffett

Warren Buffett is continuing his rather full-throated defense of Goldman Sachs, saying in a Good Morning America interview broadcast this morning that CEO Lloyd Blankfein shouldn't step down -- and that Goldman has done nothing wrong.

The SEC has filed a civil lawsuit against Goldman Sachs over a shoddy mortgage product that Goldman allegedly knew was shoddy, and a Senate subcommittee hearing that put many of the firm's top executives on the spot last week has brought the firm under even more fire.

But Buffett -- whose company invested $5 billion in Goldman during the height of the financial crisis -- is standing by Blankfein's company.

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Topics: Goldman Sachs, Lloyd Blankfein, Securities and Exchange Commission, Warren Buffett

Goldman Sachs

Trader At Heart Of Goldman Suit: I Sold Shoddy Mortgage Products To 'Widow And Orphans'

Ben Frumin | April 26, 2010, 4:48PM

Wall St. bull and Fabrice Tourre (inset)

It sure sounds like Goldman Sachs bond trader Fabrice Tourre knew exactly what he was doing.

In a series of 2007 emails released over the weekend by Goldman Sachs, Tourre, who was charged earlier this month in the SEC's civil fraud case against Goldman, comes across as a sly dealer of financial products that he seemed to know were ticking time bombs -- bragging about selling them to a "widow and orphans" -- but also as someone ethically conflicted about doing so.

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Topics: Fabrice Tourre, Goldman Sachs, Lloyd Blankfein

Goldman Sachs

Goldman Prepares Aggressive Defense Over Emails Showing Firm Made Money Betting Against Its Own Mortgage Products

Ben Frumin | April 26, 2010, 10:12AM

Sen. Carl Levin (D-MI) and Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein

Goldman Sachs is preparing an aggressive defense of emails released over the weekend by Sen. Carl Levin (D-MI), which appear to show that the investment bank made money betting against the mortgage market -- and mortgage securities that it was selling to investors.

The emails, Goldman shot back yesterday, were "cherry-picked" from "the 20 million pages of documents and emails" provided to a Senate subcommittee.

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Topics: Carl Levin, Goldman Sachs, Lloyd Blankfein

Henry Paulson

Interesting Reading: Paulson's '06 Ethics Agreement And '08 Goldman Waiver

Justin Elliott | August 10, 2009, 6:01PM

Earlier today we told you about the near-constant phone contact between then-Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and his successor as Goldman Sachs CEO, Lloyd Blankfein, during the height of the financial crisis last September.

Now, we've obtained from the Treasury Department Paulson's ethics agreement, in which he pledged not to participate in matters involving Goldman Sachs, and the waiver to that agreement granted by White House counsel Fred Fielding. You can read the agreement here and the waiver here.

Of the dozens of phone calls between Paulson and Blankfein, 26 occurred before Paulson requested and obtained a waiver to deal with matters relating to Goldman Sachs, the New York Times reported Sunday. The content of the calls is unknown. But two were the morning of Sept. 17, a day after the AIG bailout, which ultimately handed Goldman $13 billion of taxpayers' money -- before Paulson obtained the ethics waiver.

In Paulson's ethics agreement, written after President Bush plucked him from Goldman to be Treasury Secretary, all but two of eight pages mention Goldman. He concludes it by saying "these steps will ensure that I avoid even the appearance of a conflict of interest."

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Topics: AIG, Bailout, Goldman Sachs, Henry Paulson, Lloyd Blankfein

Henry Paulson

Co-Treasury Secretary Lloyd Blankfein? Paulson And Goldman Exec Talked 24 Times In Week Of AIG Bailout

Justin Elliott | August 10, 2009, 1:20PM

Blockbuster stuff from the New York Times Sunday on stunningly frequent contacts during the height of the financial crisis between Henry Paulson and his successor as CEO of Goldman Sachs, Lloyd Blankfein.

The then-Treasury Secretary and Blankfein spoke by phone two dozen times in one week in September 2008 when AIG was bailed out -- a deal that handed Goldman, a key counterparty of AIG, $13 billion in federal money.

Perhaps the most remarkable thing about the Times' account of the contacts between the two men, for which Paulson belatedly sought and received an ethics waiver, is that the phone calls were often coming from the Treasury Secretary.

In one day, Sept. 17, Paulson called Blankfein four times. Then after taking a call from President Bush in the evening, the Treasury Secretary called Blankfein yet again -- almost as if he felt obliged to keep the Goldman CEO constantly abreast of his progress. He spoke with Blankfein "far more" than with other executives, the Times reports.