Goldman Sachs hires Wells Fargo executive to lead transaction banking

By Saeed Azhar

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Goldman Sachs has hired former Wells Fargo executive Paul Camp as its new head of transaction banking, according to a memo seen by Reuters.

The bank had fired several executives in the transaction banking unit in September after they violated the firm's communications policy, according to a memo seen at the time by Reuters.

The executives included the head of the unit Hari Moorthy, sources had told Reuters.

Camp, who will also become a Goldman partner, most recently served as head of global treasury management at Wells Fargo, and prior to that he was CEO of treasury services at BNY Mellon, according to the memo.

Before the appointment, the Wall Street giant had assigned its treasurer, Philip Berlinski, to take over day-to-day management of the business alongside Akila Raman and Luc Teboul.

Raman and Teboul will work closely with Camp and continue to drive the transaction banking business, managing it day to day, the memo said. Camp will report to Berlinski.

Financial firms have faced increasing scrutiny over employee communications in recent years. U.S. regulators have so far fined dozens of Wall Street firms collectively more than $2 billion for failing to keep tabs on employees' use of "off-channel" communications including text messages and WhatsApp.

Goldman Sachs was among the first wave of big banks to receive stiff penalties from regulators for such recordkeeping failures.

Goldman Sachs said in the memo the latest appointment underscores the firm's commitment to growing its transaction banking business.

Transaction banking is a small part of Goldman Sachs' revenue, having only opened in 2020. It posted revenue of $233 million in the first nine months of the year, compared with firm wide revenue of $35 billion in the same period.

Rival JPMorgan and Citigroup are much larger players in the space.

(Reporting by Saeed Azhar; Editing by Lananh Nguyen and David Evans)