CNBC's Mary Thompson reports Goldman Sachs is replacing CFO David Viniar, with incoming officer, Harvey Schwartz.
By Roland Jones, NBC News
Harvey Schwartz, who will take over as chief financial officer at Goldman Sachs early next year, is set to receive an annual salary of $1.85 million.
Currently a senior trading executive, Schwartz will replace David Viniar as CFO at the end of January. Viniar, who plans to retire, spent 12 years in the role, making him the longest-serving CFO on Wall Street.
Viniar, 57, is also among the best-compensated executives in the financial services industry, having made $15.8 million in 2011.
However, the salary portion of Viniar?s pay is the same $1.85 million that Schwartz will receive, and is also received by the bank?s president, Gary Cohn, and its two vice chairmen, Michael Evans and John Weinberg.
Viniar was CFO at Goldman as it became a public company in 1999, and through the financial crisis of 2008. He spent a total of 32 years as an employee at the bank.
He will become a member of Goldman's board after his retirement and will become eligible for cash bonuses of several million dollars for 2011 and 2012 in addition to his conventional compensation if the company hits preset profitability targets.
Viniar said in a conference call late Tuesday that it was the right time for him to step down, as the bank is now in a strong position, from a capital and liquidity perspective.
The bank emerged from the recent financial crisis relatively unscathed, but it has not avoided bad publicity in recent years.
A former board member was found guilty in a government investigation into insider trading and had to pay a $550 million settlement with regulators over charges of securities fraud linked to mortgage investments.
But it was a scathing Op-Ed article in the New York Times from a former Goldman employee titled ?Why I Am Leaving Goldman Sachs? that grabbed the most headlines.
In his article, Greg Smith, a former executive director at the investment bank, accused Goldman of routinely ripping off its clients and described the bank?s culture as ?toxic and destructive,? putting profit ahead of the interests of its clients.
The appointment of Schwartz is the latest in a series of executive moves at Goldman as it prepares for a change in top management, perhaps to improve the bank?s public image.
Schwartz is one of a small group of executives who are seen as potential candidates to take over from current Chief Executive Officer Lloyd Blankfein should he decide to step down.
In April, Blankfein appeared in his first television interview in two years, admitting to CNBC that the bank ?hasn?t gotten everything right? in its dealings with the public.
Reuters contributed to this report.
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