Considering how most of Wall Street is limping along these days, Goldman Sachs looks pretty healthy. The investment bank is one of the few that's so far escaped the credit crunch relatively unscathed, partly because mortgages were a small part of its business, and partly because the firm had made a bet that the subprime segment would collapse.
This doesn't mean that Stacy Bash-Polley, co-head of fixed income sales in the Americas, had an easy ride. On the contrary. In early 2007, Goldman Sachs was one of the first investment banks to begin hedging its long mortgage position and marking down the value of assets on its books, in anticipation of a market correction. As a result, Bash-Polley often found herself giving customers their first taste of the storm ahead.
"We were on the front line with our clients, marking their positions consistently with where we were marking our own positions. And our clients were asking us, 'Why are you doing this?'" says Polley, who at the time oversaw sales of all mortgage products, in addition to other interest-rate products, foreign exchange and money markets. "It was a tough discussion to have."
The amount of assets being discussed wasn't trivial. The fixed income, currency and commodities division under which Bash-Polley's group belongs, contributes the largest share of revenues at Goldman Sachs: $16 billion in 2007 alone.
Ultimately, of course, Goldman's early warning saved its clients a lot of money, and for Bash-Polley, an acting buff and amateur cabaret performer, it was just another day at work. As one of the top sales people on Wall Street-and the best producer at Goldman during her years as a line salesperson from 2000 and 2004-she knows exactly how to turn lemons into lemonade.
"Clients are having a lot of difficulties because of the environment we're in, so we have to play offense," she says. "We're reaching out to our clients, helping them raise capital, helping them solve problems."
Among others products, Bash-Polley has sold foreign exchange products to clients to help them hedge against the weak dollar, inflation protection trades with payouts linked directly to the consumer price index, and swaps to help them cope with falling interest rates.
That push has helped her keep business rolling in. Revenue from her group grew 37 percent in 2007 from 2006, and is up 40 percent in the first half of this year, compared to the same period a year ago.
Those numbers aren't just the result of aggressive salesmanship. Bash-Polley says she believes in studying her clients and understanding their business before offering them customized solutions. Especially as a woman working in a predominantly male industry, Bash-Polley says doing your homework pays off.
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