GOLDMAN SACHS made more than $100 million in trading revenue on a record 46 separate days during the second quarter, or 71 per cent of the time, breaking the previous high of 34 days in the prior three months.
Trading losses occurred on two days during April, May and June, down from eight in the first quarter, the New York-based bank said in a filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission.
The company made at least $50 million on 58 of the 65 trading days in the period, or 89 per cent of the time.
Goldman Sachs, which was the biggest US securities firm before converting to a bank last year, posted the biggest profit in its history during the second quarter as revenue from trading and equity underwriting reached all-time highs. The company, which has returned $10 billion to the US treasury and paid $1.42 billion in dividends to cancel warrants, also made its largest market bets during the period.
“It’s very counterintuitive to think that they’d be able to generate this much profit and this much revenue in the middle of an ongoing recession,” said William Cohan, a former banker at JPMorgan Chase and Lazard Ltd.
But the fact that so many of their competitors are out of business or severely wounded has put them in a very strong position.
In fiscal year 2008, the firm had 90 days in which traders made more than $100 million, compared with 88 in 2007. In fiscal 2006, the figure was 49 days, up from 18 in 2005 and 14 in 2004. – (Bloomberg)
