Goldman Sachs is bringing hundreds of workers to a new Richardson office and growing in downtown Dallas

 

 

Financial giant Goldman Sachs is making a big investment in the Dallas area.

 

The New York-based firm is hiring people for a new banking operation in Richardson's Telecom Corridor.

 

And Goldman Sachs is the owner of downtown Dallas' newest office tower — the 1900 Pearl Building.

 

Goldman Sachs this week formally opened its new downtown regional office at the Trammell Crow Center skyscraper on Ross Avenue.

 

The firm has about 2,000 people working in North Texas and is adding to its employment here.

 

"Dallas is our third largest concentration behind New York and Salt Lake," Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein said on a visit to the downtown office. "We could have been anywhere except we built in Dallas and we are happy to be in Dallas."

 

There are a lot of our clients here and it's a growth place."

 

Last year Goldman Sachs announced that it was moving its North Texas regional office from its longtime location in Irving to downtown. The company has leased more than six floors in the Crow Center — which is being remodeled — and has options to take three more floors.

 

About 1,000 Goldman workers are now housed in the landmark skyscraper with plans to grow to 1,400.

 

"We knew we wanted to grow our footprint in Dallas," said Tom Dowling, CEO of Goldman Sachs Realty.

 

Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein.The firm has now moved all of its operations from Irving to downtown.

 

Goldman also has an office at Uptown's Crescent complex.

 

"That lease expires in 2020 and we are going to strongly consider moving it downtown," Dowling said. "The landlord at that building is the same as the landlord here, JPMorgan Asset Management."

 

While Goldman's big Salt Lake City operations mainly house support workers, the offices in the Dallas area handle everything from investments and banking to real estate.

 

And Goldman Sachs has rented a large office in Richardson's Galatyn Commons office campus near U.S., Highway 75 where it is locating hundreds of workers.

 

"We've got a fast growing team up there," Dowling said. "The facility up there has the capacity for 500 or 600."

 

The Richardson office houses operations of Goldman's new consumer banking business called Marcus.

 

The Marcus division — which is adding hundreds of workers in New York, Salt Lake City and the Dallas area — has already loaned more than $2.5 billion to 350,000 customers. The company is expected to have a billion dollars in annual revenue by 2020.

 

Blankfein said the company is being cautious with venture.

 

"We are growing it slowly so that we have the experience — experience we don't have," he said. "So far things are behaving better than I thought they would."

 

He said Marcus is targeting consumers with credit card debts that want to refinance at lower interest rates.

 

"We are trying to have very high credit quality — we don't want to suffer a lot of defaults," Blankfein said. "We've priced things in so we could have twice the credit loses that we have modeled and still come out okay.

 

"While some consumer lenders are ramping up their subprime loan business, Blankfein said that's not in Goldman's plan given what's happened in the past.

 

"That's why there are business cycles because people forget," he said. "I personally am not forgetting because I was there.

 

"We aren't going to participate in that."

 

While Goldman Sachs is trying new business strategies, don't look for the big financial firm to change its understated culture. There won't be a flashy sign out front of its downtown Dallas skyscraper office.

 

"We are a little bit less shy now, but still it's not our nature to advertise and put our name on buildings," Blankfein said.

 

Goldman does plan to take a larger presence in the community.

 

"One of the reasons why we are down here and investing more in Dallas is a lot of our people are spending more time in the community," said managing director Aasem Khalil. "You will see people in our team showing up more on local boards and at various philanthropic endeavors."

 

Goldman Sachs is also taking a major role in the local real estate market.

 

The company owns the new 1900 Pearl office tower in downtown Dallas that was built by developer Lincoln Property Co.

 

And Goldman Sachs has invested in numerous apartment projects and other properties in the area.

 

"Why wouldn't you — this is a high growth area," Blankfein said. "I wish we had more."

 

 

To read this article in The Dallas Morning News, click here.