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Report: Goldman Sachs' Blankfein eyeing exit ahead of 2019

Goldman Sachs Group Inc. Chairman and CEO Lloyd Blankfein is planning to step down from the investment bank's top position as early as the end of 2018, according to The Wall Street Journal.

The 63-year-old Blankfein's potential departure could promptly be followed by an announcement naming one of Goldman Sachs' two co-presidents and co-COOs, Harvey Schwartz or David Solomon, as Blankfein's successor, according to the report, which cited "people familiar with the matter."

Schwartz and Solomon were named to their current positions following former Goldman Sachs President and COO Gary Cohn's departure to join President Donald Trump's administration. Schwartz previously was the investment bank's CFO, while Solomon was Goldman Sachs' co-head of investment banking.

The exact timing of Blankfein's exit remains unclear, according to the report, which added that Blankfein may aim to leave before or early in 2019, the company's 150th anniversary. If Blankfein does exit in 2018, it would cap a 12-year tenure in Goldman Sachs' top position and a 36-year career with the company, beginning in 1982 at J. Aron & Co., which Goldman Sachs had acquired.

When reached, a Goldman Sachs official declined to comment on the report. However, later the same day that the Journal's story was published, Blankfein took to social media and appeared to push back against the report. "It's [The Wall Street Journal's] announcement...not mine," he wrote on Twitter. "I feel like Huck Finn listening to his own eulogy."