GS is a business in trouble. It is struggling to pivot away from its historic institutional trading-based business model and is pinning its hopes on rapid expansion into consumer banking and mid-corporate lending. There's a real danger of it coming unstuck when the credit cycle turns. Meanwhile the investment losses on these new business ventures are mounting, 1H ROTE remained stuck at the bottom of the peer group and revenue growth is lagging.
Recently the stock won some breathing space as GS was perceived as a winner from CCAR and as 2Q earnings came in