Goldman Sachs’ Lloyd Blankfein announces he has cancer

Lloyd Blankfein, chief executive officer of Goldman Sachs said on Tuesday that he has lymphoma.

Blankfein is one of just two United States bank chief executives to have survived the financial crisis.

“Gary Cohn probably at the top of it”, Paul Gulberg, an analyst at Portales Partners LLC, said in a phone interview.

The news about the veteran Wall Street boss, who navigated the US investment bank through the financial crisis, made the bank’s shares slid 2.8 percent to $178.30, which puts Goldman’s succession plans under the spotlight, although the market was broadly lower. He grew up in the housing projects of Brooklyn, New York, but excelled in school earning the title of valedictorian and a ticket to Harvard.

The father-of-three has been a director at the company since 2003 and became the CEO in June of 2006 taking over for Henry Paulson who became the treasure secretary. His biopsy came back last week, he said.

Blankfein’s life is a classic rags-to-riches story.

Blankfein might reach out to his fellow banker and friend JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon, who was diagnosed with throat cancer previous year. “My specialists have prompted me that amid the treatment, I will have the capacity to work generously as ordinary, driving the firm,” said the reminder.

Blankfein said in the statement that he still has “a lot of energy” in him and is “anxious to begin the treatment” as he gets strength from people who have dealt with cancer before.

Lymphoma is cancer of the lymphatic system, which is part of the immune system. One of the most curable is Hodgkin’s lymphoma, which strikes about 5,000 men in the US each year.

In a post on the firm’s website Tuesday, September 22, 2015, he underwent a series of tests after not feeling well for several weeks. He received the final diagnosis midday Monday and notified the board at around 4 p.m., a person familiar with the matter said, asking not to be identified discussing the internal talks. “I will, however, reduce some of my previously planned travel during the treatment period”, he said. The firm then faced its own reputational trauma amid regulatory fines and a congressional inquiry into its sales of mortgage securities before the credit crunch.