Not many people can say they’ve ever been a partner at Goldman Sachs. Even fewer people can say they’ve done it at age 31.
Kunal Shah can say both.
Mr. Shah joined Goldman Sachs in 2004 as an analyst in its trading business and was promoted to partner about 10 years later. Last January, he was promoted to two new roles at Goldman Sachs International: Co-CEO and Global Co-Head of Fixed Income, Currencies and Commodities. He is based in London and serves on the bank’s overarching management committee.
As part of a new Q&A series with Goldman Sachs’ top executives, Business Insider had the opportunity to sit down with Shah to discuss Europe’s technology sector, Goldman’s presence in the Middle East, and what the financial industry’s adoption of AI means for newcomers’ careers.
Below is our conversation with Shah. Edited for length and clarity.
Do you remember your early days and how did your senior bankers mentor you during your promotion?
When I stepped onto the trading floor as a full-time analyst after graduation, I was shocked by the access I had to my then-partners, even when I was new to the trading desk. When we partnered, we discovered that its interconnectivity, the ability to call a partner anywhere in the world and provide a clear baseline of trust, was amazing.
I’d give a shoutout to Ashok Varadhan, who I’ve worked with since the company’s inception and is now the company’s co-head of global banking and markets. I first met him in 2004 when I was a new analyst visiting New York for training and we agreed to have coffee. He was already a partner, but we kept in touch over time and when I went to the trading floor in London, we stayed in touch. He listened to me and welcomed discussions about risks and initiatives.
From him, I learned not only a focus on risk management, but also a willingness to take on risks and expand when there is an opportunity for the business.
With new analysts joining the company this summer, how do you think AI will impact the long-term outlook for bankers and traders?
Young talent is inherently tech-savvy and doesn’t have a tradition of why we do things a certain way. They know how to sabotage us.
Even when I was an intern, people were telling me, “Don’t rotate to the fixed income trading desk. It’s all going to be automated.” Because we were able to leverage technology and tools to scale, many of the administrative tasks that were previously performed by junior employees were no longer necessary.
For me, AI is just a natural extension of that. Many everyday tasks, such as creating presentations, building Excel models, and booking trades, don’t have to be done the same way.
The bottom-up experimentation we see across the organization is powered by the tools we’ve released. Providing these tools to employees allows people to experiment and find potentially innovative things.
If young people come in with the mindset of actually helping disrupt things and embracing change, I think the experience they’ll get in this industry will be phenomenal.
You lead Goldman Sachs International as Co-CEO of GSI and Global Co-Head of FICC. What is the most interesting aspect of sitting in that seat right now?
What both roles have in common, and what I love most about them, is that no two days are the same.
Working at FICC means being at the intersection of politics, macroeconomics, geopolitics and how these interact with different sectors and markets at the micro level. Part of the job is balancing long-term strategic views with the constant flow of the market. Even at this point, there is uncertainty in the commodity market, and we need to pay close attention to how this is reflected in central banks’ monetary policy decisions and changes in asset allocation. There is near consistency in uncertainty, and working within it is inherently exciting.
As co-CEO of Goldman Sachs International, I have had exposure to a much broader range of clients across the firm. We have approximately 29 offices throughout the region. So we have people, we have customers, and we have interactions with key policy makers, regulators, finance officials, and central bankers.
The US appears to be leading the way in AI investment and infrastructure. What is your outlook on the EMEA technology landscape and how is it changing?
Over the past decade, the number of unicorns in the broader European context has tripled. The EMEA technology sector is much broader than people think.
In terms of capital markets being US-centric, there’s definitely an element of that when you talk about hyperscalers and the huge AI-related bond issuances that we’re seeing. Many of these large technology platforms are extremely US-centric. But I don’t mean to be exclusive.
You may remember that companies like DeepMind emerged from the European technology ecosystem.
We are witnessing perhaps the largest investment cycle in history, with our research team estimating that hyperscaler capital spending could reach $700 billion to $725 billion in 2026 alone.
While the US and China are leading the LLM race, there is also a clear competitive edge in the EMEA region at the AI application layer. European entrepreneurs are adopting core models and building specialized, high-value software to solve industry-specific problems in robotics, autonomous drones, and smart factories.
As the Iran conflict continues, how do you view the potential impact of the Middle East conflict on Goldman’s international business?
The company has five offices in the region: Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Doha, Riyadh and Kuwait, and employs more than 100 people. In the past 12 months alone, we announced the opening of an office in Kuwait, a new office in Riyadh and the localization of our private wealth business there. We operate across advisory, finance and markets, and as asset managers and investors.
Gulf Cooperation Council member states have so far managed the situation very well, not only in maintaining a safe environment but also in allowing countries to continue operating with as much sense of normalcy as possible given the circumstances.
As we move beyond the current conflict, a renewed focus on infrastructure and resilience will provide other opportunities to help our clients. And our presence there makes that possible.