Bloomberg: Goldman Sachs Bans Most Staff From Advanced AI Coding Tools After Reviewing Productivity and Risk
Goldman has irked some of its staff after it banned most of them from using advanced AI tools designed for coding after reviewing productivity and risk concerns.
Context
It shows big employers pulling back on letting everyone build with coding agents, a sign that risk and cost concerns can slow AI adoption at work.
As recently as July, Goldman's chief information officer Marco Argenti praised vibe coding by traders and bankers who built tools with AI. Goldman also runs its own internal AI assistant that combines models from OpenAI, Anthropic and Google. Earlier this year it restricted Claude for staff in Hong Kong.
Deep dive
Bloomberg (@business) reported on Nov 2 that Goldman Sachs has irked some of its staff after banning most of them from using advanced AI coding tools, following a review of productivity and risk concerns.
According to Bloomberg's Todd Gillespie, Goldman had for months let bankers use Anthropic's Claude Code and Microsoft's GitHub tools for work. Internal guidance updated in October now limits those tools to engineers. A person familiar with the matter told Bloomberg that some traders are frustrated, because they had used the tools to monitor client trading flows, model market changes and positions, and create written and graphic content. The ban does not apply to strats, the staff who work between trading, quantitative research and software engineering.
Goldman spokesperson Nick Carcaterra told Bloomberg that the bank makes certain AI tools available to find the best use cases, and after a period of experimentation that weighs factors including productivity and risk management, puts them in the hands of those best suited to use them long term.
The move contrasts with the bank's earlier enthusiasm. In July, Argenti described non technical staff building solutions with AI and handing them to the firm's 12,000 engineers to improve. Bloomberg places the change within a wider effort on Wall Street to work out how thousands of workers should use AI while managing cybersecurity, cost and productivity. The report relies on internal guidance and unnamed sources, and Goldman's statement did not dispute it.
What to expect next
Watch whether other banks follow with similar limits or keep widening access to coding agents. Anthropic and Microsoft may face more questions from large customers about controls, audit trails and data access. If Goldman later reopens the tools with stricter guardrails, that could become a template for regulated industries. The frustration among traders will also show how hard it is to take back tools once staff rely on them every day.