A：In the fourth quarter of 2025, Goldman Sachs reported earnings per share of $14.1, an return on equity (ROE) of 16%, and a return on tangible equity (ROTE) of 17.1%. For the full year, the firm delivered earnings per share of $51.32, a 32% increase over the prior year, with an ROE of 15% and ROTE of 16%.

A：Since the firm's first Investor Day in 2020, Goldman Sachs has grown firm-wide revenues by roughly 60%, increased EPS by 144%, improved returns by 500 basis points, and delivered a total shareholder return of over 340%, surpassing its peer group. The firm has also materially improved its risk profile, reduced historical principal investments by over 90%, and enhanced the resilience of its earnings.

A：Goldman Sachs has maintained strong performance across its core businesses, with a leading global banking and markets position, particularly as the top M&A advisor and leading Equities franchise. The firm has gained wallet share, increased more durable fixed income and equity financing revenues, set records in asset wealth management, and raised significant capital in alternatives. Additionally, the firm's investment banking has been advised to handle substantial M&A transactions.

A：Growth opportunities for the firm's asset and wealth management business include expanding client bases through increased advisors and content specialists, enhancing loan product offerings, broadening alternative investment opportunities, and continuing to elevate the client experience with digital offerings and thought leadership. New targets include a pretax margin of 30% in AWM, and a long-term fee-based net inflow of 5% annually. In asset wealth management alternatives and solutions, the firm plans to scale its platform, potentially raising between $75 and $100 billion annually, with a goal of reaching $750 billion in alternative assets under supervision by 2030.

A：Goldman Sachs has entered into a strategic partnership with Fidelity Investments for retirement and wealth solutions and has announced several acquisitions: a venture capital platform to bolster its second investing franchise, and Innovate, which significantly scales the business in active ETFs and outcome-based ETFs. These partnerships and acquisitions are aimed at enhancing and diversifying the firm's capabilities in the asset and wealth management sector.

A：Goldman Sachs' approach to capital management involves investing in client franchises at attractive returns, sustainably growing the dividend, and returning excess capital to shareholders through buybacks. The firm is focused on deploying capital across its franchise, particularly in areas like acquisition financing and increasing lending to ultra-high net worth clients. The firm also has the capacity to return more capital to shareholders, as evidenced by the recent increase in the quarterly dividend and substantial remaining buyback capacity.

A：One Goldman Sachs 3.0 is the firm's new operating model that utilizes artificial intelligence to re-engineer processes and improve efficiency. The initiative is designed to drive accountability and will be updated with additional details over time.

A：Goldman Sachs is an aspirational brand that attracts quality talent. In 2025, the firm received over 1.1 million experienced hire applications, indicating its ability to draw a large number of skilled professionals. In its summer internship program, the firm maintained a selection rate of less than 1%. Many of these individuals go on to have long careers at the firm, evidenced by the fact that roughly 45% of its partners began as campus hires. Additionally, many alumni have become important clients or have assumed CE suite roles at companies with significant market caps or assets under management.

A：Goldman Sachs has outlined firm-wide through-the-cycle targets and is confident in its ability to continue delivering on these strategic priorities. In the near term, the firm believes it is well-positioned to exceed its return targets, supported by a number one M&A advisory position, robust global banking and markets franchise, and a scaled asset wealth management business with higher margin and return targets. Notable achievements include record revenues of $13.5 billion in the fourth quarter and earnings per share of $14.1, as well as full-year earnings per share growth of 27% over the previous year.

A：Goldman Sachs is in the process of narrowing its strategic focus and has made corresponding minor organizational changes, which are reflected in updated segments within the financial results. These changes are part of the firm's One Goldman Sachs 3.0 initiative aimed at enhancing productivity and efficiency. The firm's fourth-quarter and full-year financial results reflect a record year for its global banking and markets segment, with robust performance across various advisory, debt, and equity underwriting activities. The firm's investment banking backlog also rose, driven primarily by advisory services. The results underscore the firm's deep client connectivity and the positive investment banking environment outlook for 2026.

A：In the fourth quarter, Goldman Sachs generated revenues of $13.5 billion, with earnings per share of $14.1, an return on equity (ROE) of 16%, and a return on tangible equity (ROTE) of 17.1%. For the full year, earnings per share reached $51.32, a 27% increase over the prior year, with an ROE of 15% and an ROTE of 16%. The company's net income benefitted from a portfolio transition, notably a $2.3 billion revenue reduction from the Apple Card portfolio transition being more than offset by a $2.5 billion reserve release upon moving the portfolio to held for sale. Despite the transition and strategic organizational changes, the firm's financial performance showed year-over-year improvement.

A：Goldman Sachs plans to scale its wealth business by continuing to broaden its footprint and coverage in the ultra-high net worth sector, where the firm has a leading position in the United States and is looking to expand in Europe and Asia. The firm has decided to focus on full-service wealth management for ultra-high net worth clients, while exploring broader access to wealth through third-party channels. Investments are being made in third-party wealth capabilities, including partnerships with Rias and expanding the firm's product distribution reach using its diverse and complete product offering. This strategy aims to maintain focus on ultra-high net worth wealth while benefiting from broader market access.

A：Goldman Sachs has raised the floor on its returns, meaning that it now operates with a goal to maintain mid-teens returns through the cycle. The firm believes it can position itself to exceed these targets in the near term, while acknowledging that there may be environments with headwinds. The firm's confidence stems from its strategic focus, investment in capabilities, and efforts to elevate returns. Although it does not predict the future, the firm believes it has materially uplifted its baseline and is well-positioned for different economic cycles.

A：The new target for the asset wealth management business is to operate at a higher margin of 30%, which is expected to drive a higher return and elevate the overall performance of the firm.

A：The regulatory environment of the last five years has imposed costs and burdens on the firm that will no longer be an issue going forward, providing flexibility to invest in other growth initiatives.

A：The firm recognizes the high bar for M&A activity but maintains that the bar is very high and cultural integration is crucial to maintaining Goldman Sachs' uniqueness. They feel good about the past successes but believe that the likelihood of finding transformational opportunities that align with their values is slim.

A：The firm views the current setup as conducive to constructive M&A and capital markets activity in 2026, with potential for a very good year if no exogenous events negatively impact sentiment. They anticipate a constructive environment for the next few years due to a combination of fiscal, monetary, and deregulatory stimulus.

A：The firm notes that certain categories of investment banking activities have started to trend above the average level, while the IPO business and some debt activities are below average. These trends suggest there is still potential for further upside across capital markets activities as the cycle progresses.

A：The firm's capital deployment strategy prioritizes reinvesting excess capital in their core businesses. They plan to continue using buybacks as an important tool to support shareholder returns, provided that it aligns with their goal to fuel the franchise and support client activity.

A：The firm's backlog is at a very high level, which is the highest in four years and among the highest ever. This high backlog indicates that the firm is confident in their ability to deliver strong results in the future, including replenishing the results from Q4 and for full-year 2025.

A：Following the closure of the deal, the firm expects a small pre-tax loss for the year in the segment, mainly due to the Apple Card business and the savings program. The savings program will continue as is for Apple Card users without interruption or change, and there are no current plans to transition it. The firm is focused on the transition of the card while maintaining service to existing customers.

A：The efficiency ratio was negatively affected by the Apple Card transition, but when looking at the full year, it became clear that the firm delivered significant operating leverage. For the fourth quarter, there was a significant increase in operating expenses, but the year over year analysis showed the opposite.

A：Goldman Sachs is focusing on using AI to drive productivity and efficiency in its two core businesses, rather than transforming the entire firm with AI. They plan to use technology to reimagine operating processes and create real efficiency. The firm aims to redeploy technology to free up capacity to invest in growth areas such as wealth management, which is currently constrained due to balancing returns.

A：Goldman Sachs has identified six specific processes where they are focusing on deploying technology to improve efficiency. These processes require significant work and progress is being made, but full confidence in the information has not yet been achieved to publicly disclose them.

A：Goldman Sachs expects the technology to accelerate productivity gains, continuing a trend of increasing revenue per employee over the past 25 years. The firm is committed to providing more transparency on efficiency progress and the deployment of that progress into the business, although specific metrics for measuring progress over five years were not detailed.

A：Goldman Sachs has a significant presence in both tokenization and prediction markets, with teams actively engaged in understanding and assessing these emerging opportunities. They are focusing on stablecoins and the Clarity Act, as well as prediction markets and their potential integration with existing businesses, taking into account the regulatory structure as it develops.

A：Goldman Sachs has grown its financing business from being underweighted to closely weighted, and sees potential to incorporate this activity into its asset management business. They are risk conscious and see opportunities to manage and grow this business without being fully on balance sheet. The firm aims to discuss this topic more in the coming years.

A：Goldman Sachs maintains a tight focus on managing non-compensation expenses. They aim to balance transaction-based expenses with constrained non-transaction expenses, such as market development. The firm is particularly focused on growing their asset management business and views it as a strategic growth opportunity.

A：Goldman Sachs expects to grow lending activities and increase lending penetration in 2026. They anticipate growing overall deposit activity but also expect some net interest margin (NIM) compression due to expectations on the rate cycle.

A：Goldman Sachs achieved above-target asset flows in wealth management in the fourth quarter, which were influenced by efforts with existing advisors and customers, as well as hiring more advisors to attract new customers.

A：The firm believes wealth management presents a significant opportunity for growth and is making extra efforts to drive accountability and focus on this opportunity set. They plan to maintain the focus on this growth, which is a component of the overall revenue trajectory in the wealth business.

A：The firm's share in the ultra-high net worth segment of the wealth management business in the United States is estimated to be mid single digits, which is considered leading. The firm acknowledges the business is highly fragmented with hundreds of competitors, but believes it has the potential to grow market share by adding advisors, expanding its footprint, and broadening the client base it touches.

A：The firm has specific targets related to the alternative investments opportunity set. They recognize that given the average wealth of their clients, north of $75 million, it is appropriate and beneficial to advise a distribution of exposure to alternatives. There is an opportunity to further grow this with their existing clients.

A：The firm believes market conditions and an end to valuation challenges will influence the IPO market this year. They anticipate an increase in activity from sponsors and more large companies deciding to go public, which could lead to a significant number of IPOs and large companies entering the market. This confluence of factors is expected to be constructive provided the current market environment persists.

A：The firm suggests that the current political administration is more supportive of consolidation, which may influence M&A activity. They believe the regulatory environment for M&A has changed over the last four years but doesn't constitute a blank check for large-scale consolidation. CEOs are now more inclined to consider big, strategic, transformative M&A opportunities, leading to an upswing in M&A activity.

A：In the current regulatory environment, there is an opportunity to redeploy human capital and consulting professional fees towards driving growth across the firm while still maintaining safety and soundness. The focus on safety and soundness of the banking system is resulting in a different formulation and mix of expenses that frees up capacity for redeployment.

A：The firm expects the investment banking fee mix to continue evolving with organic growth, particularly in asset wealth management. Although global banking markets have grown faster than expected, the firm aims to accelerate the shift in the mix through disciplined organic and inorganic growth strategies. They expect asset wealth management to continue to grow faster and shift the mix over time.

A：The firm's base case view suggests that investment banking fees in 2026 could approach or close in on the levels seen in 2021, which were over $14 billion. However, the firm specifically refers to advisory volumes and fees, which are highly correlated. They expect equity capital markets levels to be meaningfully below the 2021 peak but higher than in 2022. Advisory volumes are expected to grow, leading to increased activity across the firm.