There will never be another sh---y deal at Goldman Sachs Group Inc.
The New York company is telling employees that they will no longer be able to get away with profanity in electronic messages. That means all 34,000 traders, investment bankers and other Goldman employees must restrain themselves from using a vast vocabulary of oft-used dirty words on Wall Street, including the six-letter expletive that came back to haunt the company at a Senate hearing in April.
"[B]oy, that timberwo[l]f was one sh---y deal," Thomas Montag, who helped run Goldman's securities business, wrote in a June 2007 e-mail that was repeatedly referred to at the hearing.
Montag, who couldn't be reached for comment, wouldn't be allowed to send that e-mail under Goldman's sanitized communications policy, which is being enforced by screening software. Even swear words spelled with asterisks are out.
A Goldman spokeswoman said: "Of course we have policies about the use of appropriate language and we are always looking for ways to ensure that they are enforced."
The new edict — delivered verbally, of course — has left some employees wondering if the rule also applies to shorthand for expletives such as "WTF" or legitimate terms that sound similar to curses.
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