Goldman Sachs exec reportedly said Apple Card savings account was a ****ing mistake

A Goldman Sachs exec reportedly responded to the announcement of the Apple Card savings account by immediately declaring it a mistake.

According to the report, the unnamed Goldman partner said: “We should have never done this f—ing thing” …

Goldman has lost big on the Apple Card

Goldman has long been reported to regret the entire Apple Card partnership, after notching up more than a billion dollars in losses by January of this year, and more recently headed toward losing its second billion.

The bank has historically made its money through serving the financial needs of corporations, financial institutions, and governments. Its move into consumer lending is a relatively recent development, and a massively unsuccessful one. Goldman has spent much of this year trying to exit the consumer finance business.

The bank sold most of its personal loans, along with its main consumer lending business, GreenSky – taking a big financial hit in the process.

It has for some time been trying to offload the Apple Card partnership, so far without success. It has reportedly been in discussions with Amex for some time, but it’s unclear why the card company would be interested in picking up a loss-making business. Amex also has a strong brand of its own, so is likely to kick back on an Apple branded product.

Savings account was ‘a ****ing mistake’

A new WSJ report says that one exec was unimpressed by the bank deepening its relationship with Apple through the launch of an Apple Card savings account.

When Goldman Sachs and Apple launched their joint savings account in April, Goldman held a town hall at its headquarters, where bank executives talked it up. One executive had a different message shortly afterward. “We should have never done this f—ing thing,” the Goldman partner told colleagues.

The likely reason for this is that the many millions of dollars in savings accounts make it much harder to Goldman to offload the Apple Card business – as that money will have been invested, and the bank would have to raise it in cash in order to hand over the deal to someone else.

Some at Goldman want Apple to lend its own money

Another potential exit plan put forward by some within Goldman is that Apple could lend its own money in future.

Goldman employees working on the Apple partnership have floated other options, including letting Apple take over a bigger piece of the partnership, according to people familiar with the matter. For example, one idea proposed that Apple could become the lender for new credit-card spending and issuance, with Goldman continuing to manage the existing loans.

However, that idea doesn’t seem to have gained any traction in either company, the report saying that it’s not under active consideration, and hasn’t been discussed at a senior level within either Goldman or Apple.

Adding to the bank’s headaches with the Apple Card is that it’s under investigation by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau for failing to promptly address errors and refund cardholders.

In what seems like something straight out of a farce, Goldman apparently blames Apple, as all cardholders get their bills on the same date, giving customer service reps a huge peak in workload. Why the bank agreed this arrangement in the first place – instead of the usual practice of having different dates for different customers, to even out the support requirement – is unclear, but points to another sign of the bank having too little experience in consumer lending to know what it is doing.

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