Goldman’s unmatched sold credit protection up 15% in Q3

Written notionals not hedged by buying identical protection on riskiest names jumped 85%

The notional gap between credit derivatives written and purchased by Goldman Sachs on the market’s riskiest names widened significantly in the third quarter, driven by credit index rebalancing and client repositioning ahead of the US election.

By end-September, the bank had sold $12.05 billion in credit derivatives linked to reference entities with credit spreads exceeding 1,000 basis points. Of this, $8.62 billion was hedged through purchased protection on identical names. This left $3.43