John Waldron, president and Chief Operating Officer of Goldman Sachs, speaks during the Goldman Sachs Investor Day at Goldman Sachs Headquarters in New York City, U.S., Feb. 28, 2023.
Brendan McDermid | Reuters
Goldman Sachs added its president and chief operating officer John Waldron to its board of directors a month after he was given a retention bonus, cementing his position as a potential successor to CEO David Solomon.
Waldron, 55, joins Solomon, 63, as the second member of the management committee to have a seat on the board.
“It does appear that firmer succession planning is underway,” said Stephen Biggar, a banking analyst at Argus Research.
The bonuses, which vest in five years, were awarded to Solomon and Waldron in an effort by Goldman’s board to retain top leaders, the bank said last month.
Waldron, who has been president and chief operating officer since October 2018, oversees the leaders of the bank’s three main divisions. He previously served as co-head of investment banking, a role he assumed in 2014 after joining Goldman in 2000.
Gary Cohn, a former president of the firm, previously served as a director alongside Solomon’s predecessor, Lloyd Blankfein.
Cohn left Goldman in late 2016 to join President Donald Trump’s first administration as an economic adviser and lead the White House National Economic Council.
The bank also announced on Wednesday it added Accenture’s Chief Financial Officer KC McClure as an independent director of the board.
Goldman Sachs earned its biggest quarterly profit in more than three years as its investment bankers brought in more deal fees, while its traders benefited from active markets, the company said in January.