Is Goldman Sachs CEO David Solomon eyeing a comeback as a DJ? The Wall Street giant would like to pull the plug on any such speculation.
A few years back, Solomon had attracted attention with his side hustle spinning records in the Hamptons under the moniker DJ D-Sol. The 64-year-old banker, who joined Goldman in 1999, was DJ-ing electro dance music at high-end parties even after he became CEO in 2018.
He decided to drop all of the above in 2023 as publicity over his hobby, particularly during the COVID lockdowns, became a “distraction” that drew consternation from some fellow bankers and members of the firm’s buttoned-down board of directors.
That’s why tongues began wagging over the Memorial Day weekend after Solomon published a New York Times op-ed on artificial intelligence.
The op-ed, I should point out, was a good one. It explained how AI is creating many more jobs than it’s disrupting. While there will be displacement, technology has always led the way to economic prosperity, Solomon wrote.
Your humble correspondent read the piece to the end, where he noticed a contributor bio that stated: “David M. Solomon, in addition to running Goldman Sachs, is an electronic dance music producer known as DJ D-Sol.”
Before I got my hopes up that I might run into Solly at a swanky Hamptons rave, I tossed a call into Goldman’s PR department, where a rep said there is “no change” in his boss’s DJ hiatus. Solomon, he added, didn’t request the DJ line in the bio.
“The Times didn’t share the bio before publishing,” Goldman Sachs PR chief Tony Fratto said, clarifying that the Times didn’t consult with them about it.
A rep for the Times had no immediate comment.
Solomon hasn’t produced music in about three years. He no longer spins records at public events, although he will do private gatherings. The last post on his DJer Instagram page “David Solomon Music” was in November 2022.
I, for my part, could never quite understand why Solly’s weekend activities caused such a stir inside the big investment bank. Who was he harming? But if you look back, the negative coverage was relentless, so much so that people on Wall Street were doubting whether Solomon would remain CEO.
He has, of course, and Goldman shareholders should be happy. The stock is up more than 60% over the past year compared to a 15% rise in shares of its investment banking archrival, Jamie Dimon’s JPMorgan, and a 26% spike in the S&P.
Even better, check out Goldman’s performance since Solly officially gave up the DJ-ing in October 2023: It’s up nearly 250%, more than twice as much as JPM and some three times higher than the S&P.
In other words, the Hamptons party scene’s loss has been Goldman Sachs shareholders’ gain.
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