The CEO of Goldman Sachs, Lloyd Blankfein, said he is working to fill the company’s new European headquarters in London that is currently under construction. He, however, stated that the exit of Britain from the region is something that the bank cannot do anything about.
While expressing his thoughts via Twitter on Monday, he tweeted that, “In London. GS still investing in our big new Euro headquarters here. Expecting/hoping to fill it up, but so much outside our control. #Brexit,” his tweet was followed by a bird’s eye picture of the new building.
The Wall Street bank is currently constructing an office in London that is .1 million square foot, with the building set to be occupied in 2019 initially. It will also accommodate 6,000 employees who will be from the UK, even though the firm wants to see to it that it can still offer service to its European clients after Brexit. It will, however, have a limited access to the EU market when since it will be in Britain.
The company has been given the flexibility to reduce the number of floors they occupy in the building, thus it is not a must that they occupy the entire office, a source close to the issue stated. The flexibility has been in place even before the Brexit vote was done. They might decide to do like they did in Germany. Earlier this month, the bank stated that it had agreed to lease office space of a new building in Frankfurt, allowing them to house up to 1,000 staff.
This figure is five times larger than the current 200 staff on their roster. If staff is added, the bank’s activities like trading, investment banking, and asset management would only increase. Speculation and rumors were spreading earlier this month after he tweeted that he is making plans to spend more time in their office in Frankfurt. He tweeted on the 19th October, “Just left Frankfurt. Great meetings, great weather, really enjoyed it. Good, because I’ll be spending a lot more time there. #Brexit,”
With London no longer an option due to Brexit, Frankfurt has been the beneficiary city as banks such as JPMorgan, Citi and Morgan Stanley all rolling out plans to expand their operations in Europe via Frankfurt.
