After expanding it field of membership to employees of other Wall Street firms last year, Goldman Sachs Employees Credit Union has run into a storage problem. After bonus season this year, so much cash flooded the CU that it has filled up the 9,000-square-foot vault deep in the subbasement of its new headquarters building in downtown New York.

"I've got $10,000-bills coming outta my ears," said the CU's president/CEO, Bea Dogooder. "After we filled up the vault, I started trucking it to my estate in Great Neck, but my chauffer is all ticked off that he now can't get to the Lamborghini in the garage."

All these deposits have also put a serious ding in the credit union's capital ratio, which plummeted from 9.0% to 6.0%, teetering on the boarder of no longer being adequately capitalized. However, the credit union has found a back door to TARP money through its sponsor organization to help prop it up.

Goldman Sachs executives were very grateful for this boon. "I've got all this bonus money, so I don't need to borrow money to help out my credit union's capital ratio. That's not my problem," Goldman executive Ira Cheatsya said. "We should just convert it to a bank so the credit union can expand its access capital, and then I could sit on the board and make big bucks for two-hour, monthly meetings." Upon hearing that credit union boards were run by volunteers he laughed until he cried, wiping his eyes on a $100-bill.

But one problem Cheatsya faces is the unique way the CU pays interest on its share accounts. Each quarter members are required to come to the CU and roll the dice. The result may result in a 2% interest payment, but if the member rolls snake eyes, that member not only forfeits the interest but must pay a 2% fee. "It's all part of the Goldman philosophy of hedging everything," said Cheatsya. "And if they roll snake eyes twice, we give them some Greek government bonds we've got laying around. They make great wall paper."

Editors Note: Happy April Fool's Day.

Instant Insights /

Goldman Sachs CU Seeks More Vault Space

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