Goldman lost $1.2 billion in just 9 months in newest division

Three months after Goldman Sachs Group Inc. carved out a new division to house what's left of its once-ambitious foray on Main Street, it's giving shareholders a clearer look at those financials.

The collection of businesses including Goldman's Apple Card now packaged into the segment dubbed Platform Solutions racked up more than $1.2 billion in pretax losses in last year's first nine months, with the drop accelerating every quarter.

That tally, disclosed in a regulatory filing Friday, is meant to help shareholders and analysts prepare to track Platform Solutions' evolution once Goldman begins breaking out its performance in quarterly reports, starting on Tuesday. But it also shines new light on how much the expansion has been dragging down the New York-based firm's bottom line.


From the start of 2020 through the end of September, Platform Solutions' pretax losses piled up to $3 billion, the filing shows. When the latest quarter's figures get added to it next week, that cumulative loss will approach $4 billion in the three-year span and $2 billion for the year driven by loan-loss provisions, people with knowledge of the matter said.

The provisions for the first nine months of 2022 totaled $942 million, the filing shows.

The transaction-banking business line, which is also a part of this group now, is probably the only profitable element.

The numbers released Friday offer clues into what Goldman has been spending to establish the high-profile Apple Card, created through a partnership with Apple Inc.

The division's $1 billion pretax loss reported for 2021 was mostly tied to the Apple Card, people with knowledge of the numbers said. And about $2 billion in 2022 mainly stems from the Apple card and installment-lending platform GreenSky, the people said.

The question is whether Goldman will feel more pressure to ease off on what executives have viewed as investments now that the expenses are more easily visible to shareholders.

Goldman's overall consumer business was initially supposed to break even by the end of last year. Executives in the new Platform Solutions division now forecast it may achieve that sometime in 2025, though a final target has yet to be set, people with knowledge of the matter said.