An apocalyptic account of Goldman Sachs 'investee call' went viral on social media faster than the coronavirus — and now the investment bank wants to set the tape directly.

The story snowballed after first beingness reported in a Reddit post on March fifteen. Information technology has since been shared endless times in Telegram and other social media.

User 'nottodaymonk' posted that his friend had just "got off a Goldman Sachs Investee call where 1500 of their investee companies dialed in". He listed several "takeaways" from the call, the well-nigh pregnant of which was a prediction of "global health and economic plummet" in 6 to 8 weeks.

That's not quite right says Goldman Sachs

Patrick Scanlan, vice president of corporate communications at Goldman Sachs, sent the following statement to Cointelegraph, distancing themselves from the reported comments:

"The comments beingness circulated on social media platforms attributing statistics on COVID-xix to Goldman Sachs were prepared by an unidentified author, were not authorized, and contain erroneous data and attribution. On March 12, the firm's principal economist and main medical officer held a call for clients, during which they conveyed data on the economic and marketplace touch of COVID-xix. During the phone call, various statistics on the pandemic were cited and attributed to legitimate sources including governments and were not necessarily presented every bit a Goldman Sachs view. The market and economic views presented on the call were consistent with electric current published research views."

Goldman Sachs did not explicitly deny the veracity of nottodaymonk'due south claims, however information technology queried some of the statistics presented. The company stressed that "the market and economic views" expressed during the call were consequent with its public reports.

Goldman Sachs' public views on the economical touch of coronavirus

An official Goldman Sachs report from March 15, "US Daily: Downgrading Our U.s. GDP Forecasts" predits "real GDP growth of 0% in Q1 (from +0.7%), -5% in Q2 due north (from 0%), +three% in Q3 (from +1%), and +iv% in Q4 (from +2¼%)".

Source:  Goldman Sach Economical Research

On an annual basis, Goldman Sachs downgraded its 2022 Gdp forecast to 0.four% from 1.2%. For reference, in 2022 the U.S. economy expanded 2.three%.

While the references to a 'beer virus' (Corona) make information technology clear the notes are not verbatim, it is certainly possible that the numbers reported by nottodaymonk were discussed in the phone call — and a recent report from London's Regal Higher also contains some morbid forecasts that make Goldman'due south written report stake in comparison.