Wall Street’s top firms have been reticent to criticize President Trump’s trade policy, but Goldman took it to a new level on Monday.
Goldman Sachs on Monday revealed its latest financial results and outlook for the future, and in a deft feat of linguistics, its executives managed not to utter the word “tariff” once.
Instead, in an hourlong call with analysts, David M. Solomon, the bank’s chief executive, unfurled a bouquet of euphemisms, saying that there had been “landscape changes,” “uncertainty about how certain things that are close will proceed forward” and a change in “constructs” that impacted how international businesses “interact to the U.S. and global economic system.”
Asked directly about how the investment bank’s trading business was faring this month, Mr. Solomon stated that, “On April 2, a handful of things happened that shifted perspective, but I would say there were things going on before April 2 that shifted perspective,” as well.
That was the day that President Trump unveiled a wide swath of global tariffs, sending stock markets crashing and creating angst across the international economy.
As one of the world’s largest elite investment banks, Goldman finds itself very much in the middle of the market and economic turmoil that Mr. Trump’s tariff policies have unleashed.
But based on their comments on Monday, the leadership at Goldman Sachs is not only avoiding the appearance of criticizing Mr. Trump, they are steering clear of mentioning him and the specifics of his policies all together.