Goldman Sachs (GS) shares rose about 4% early Tuesday, October 13, to around $925, after the bank crushed third-quarter estimates. It earned $17.01 per share against a $13.02 LSEG consensus, and net revenue rose 23% to $18.68 billion, its second-best quarter ever.
Here’s the odd part. During the same quarter, Goldman spent $3 billion buying back its own stock at an average of $1,048.73 a share. Even after today’s jump, the stock sits about 12% below that price.
What Drove Goldman’s Beat
- Equities: revenue jumped 72% to $6.44 billion, on financing and derivatives.
- Investment banking: fees rose 21% to $3.22 billion, and advisory set a record.
- FICC: slipped 1% to $3.47 billion (the bond-trading softness that also hit JPMorgan).
- Asset & Wealth Management: revenue rose 14% to $5.05 billion.
- Platform Solutions: revenue fell 72% to $170 million, hit by markdowns on the Apple Card portfolio.
How Much of This Can Goldman Repeat?
TIKR’s data shows how far the trading and dealmaking business has stretched. Global Banking & Markets revenue held near $10 billion a quarter through most of 2025, then surged to $15.52 billion in the second quarter of 2026. The third quarter’s $13.46 billion is still up 32% from a year ago, but it’s down 13% from the prior quarter. The peak may already be behind it.
Asset & Wealth Management is the steadier half. Its $5.05 billion this quarter, per the company’s release, tops the $4.90 billion high on TIKR’s chart.
Returns have rebuilt alongside it. On TIKR’s calculation, Goldman’s return on equity fell to 8.43% in 2023 and recovered to 16.55% in 2025. Goldman’s own measure, return on average common equity, runs a little lower (7.5% and 15.0% in those years), and the bank put this quarter at an annualized 18.7%.
Goldman Stock’s Round Trip This Year
The market has already been pricing in a trading slowdown. Goldman’s forward P/E hit 18.48x in mid-2026 and has since dropped to 14.00x, about 24% lower. Before today’s gain, Reuters noted the shares were up only about 1.7% in 2026, trailing Morgan Stanley (MS) and the S&P 500.
That de-rating has some logic: second-quarter Global Banking & Markets revenue already looks like the high-water mark. But 14x still sits above Goldman’s 12.05x average since late 2021, so the stock isn’t priced for a collapse either.
What Goldman Stock Is Worth If the Boom Fades
The question I cared about was what happens if this quarter turns out to be the good times rather than the new normal.
So I built my model on caution: revenue growth of just 3.2% a year from 2025’s base, which bakes in a sharp fade after 2026’s surge, and a P/E that drifts lower by about 1.8% a year from today’s 14x. The one thing I gave Goldman credit for is margin. A 29.3% net income margin sits a touch above this quarter’s 28%, which the bigger wealth business should help hold.
That still gets the stock to about $1,191 by the end of 2030. From the $894 starting price in my model, that’s a 33% price gain, or about 7% a year, excluding dividends. After today’s jump, the upside is closer to 29%. The target also sits about 14% above what Goldman itself paid for its shares last quarter.
Conclusion
Goldman just showed that it can earn an 18.7% return in a strong market, and the stock trades at a lower multiple than it did three months ago. The risk is that trading revenue keeps falling from its second-quarter peak, and JPMorgan (JPM) already showed today that a bond-desk slowdown can turn a beat into a miss.
Even on a fading-boom model, though, Goldman stock offers about 6% annualized price upside from around $925 through the end of 2030, excluding dividends, and management’s own buyback price was well above where shares trade now. Morgan Stanley’s results on Wednesday, October 14, will show whether Goldman’s equities surge was industry-wide or its own.
Think my growth assumption is too cautious, or too generous? Build your own Goldman Sachs model in about 60 seconds on TIKR, starting from Wall Street’s consensus estimates. It’s free. Learn more here.
So what is Goldman Sachs stock actually worth?
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Disclaimer:
Please note that the articles on TIKR are not intended to serve as investment or financial advice from TIKR or our content team, nor are they recommendations to buy or sell any stocks. We create our content based on TIKR Terminal’s investment data and analysts’ estimates. Our analysis might not include recent company news or important updates. TIKR has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. Thank you for reading, and happy investing!
