Goldman Sachs is setting up a WeWork office in London as an emergency trading floor
- Goldman Sachs has set up a "disaster recovery" trading floor in a WeWork office space in London.
- The site is near the bank's new headquarters in Farringdon in central London. Goldman also has a disaster trading floor site in Croydon, much further away.
- The bank was one of WeWork's advisers during its failed IPO attempt. The bank at one stage valued the company between $61 billion and $96 billion, according to the Financial Times.
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The relationship between Goldman Sachs and WeWork took another turn after the Financial Times reported that the bank giant is setting up an emergency "disaster recovery" trading floor in a WeWork office in London.
The Financial Times reported that the WeWork space will be used in case of any disruption at the firm's new London headquarters nearby. The new trading floor will be operational by the end of this year.
Oddly, the WeWork location in Holborn is in close proximity to Goldman's new offices in Farringdon, so any disaster affecting central London would likely impact both sites. The FT wrote: "A more serious disaster affecting the broader area would result in Goldman's staff moving to a more distant site in Croydon on the edge of the UK capital."
This development comes as WeWork deals with the fall out from its failed IPO, on which Goldman Sachs was an adviser. The bank has had a relationship with WeWork going as far back as 2014.
The newspaper previously reported that Goldman Sachs had valued the company anywhere between $62 billion and a whopping $96 billion. WeWork has since pulled the IPO plan.
Goldman had worked to "embed" itself into WeWork founder and former CEO Adam Neumann's financial life, the newspaper has reported, noting that David Solomon himself, the bank's CEO, visited WeWork's London headquarters to "to kiss the ring."
The Financial Times also reported that Goldman had invested directly into the office-space company as far back as 2014, citing data from PitchBook. The FT said that WeWork is also in discussions to lease Goldman's old London office, now mostly empty, on London's Fleet Street in the City. The FT said that building is owned by an "overseas investor."
Goldman over the summer began moving into its new $1.2 billion office in London, the new European headquarters. The new office has a trading floor roughly the size of two soccer pitches and will host around 6,500 employees.
Goldman Sachs and WeWork declined to comment to Markets Insider.
