Goldman Sachs currently has around 49,000 employees and even after the layoffs, the Wall Street bigwig will still have more employees than it did in 2020|Ivan Radic|CC BY 2.0

After aggressively hiring almost 11,000 employees during the COVID-19 pandemic, investment banking firm Goldman Sachs (GS) is planning to lay off nearly 4,000 staff early next year, according to sources.

It had laid off 500 employees just this September.

Is this normal?
Wall Street analysts say that in a typical year, GS lays off 2% to 5% of its workforce and cuts bonuses for underperforming employees. But these actions were put on hold in 2020 due to the pandemic. The 2021 boomtime profits for GS also made it unnecessary to release the hold.

Why now?
Slumps in deal-making, fundraising, overall profitability, and spending billions of dollars building its Main Street bank—Marcus—have cost GS a lot.

What now?
The supposed layoffs might take place in early 2023; Goldman Sachs has around 49,000 employees. In 2018, when David M Solomon took over as the CEO, he went on a hiring spree.

Even with the layoffs, this Wall Street bigwig will still have more employees than it did in 2020.

Many investment banks like Citigroup and Morgan Stanley have undergone layoffs this year due to the Wall Street fizzle in deal-making.