In May, Goldman Sachs issued a memo to staff announcing that two of the three co-heads of the bank’s powerful securities division were to leave the firm the following month. The pair’s respective job histories were typical of those who had held the coveted co-head roles: Pablo Salame cut his teeth trading bonds; Isabelle Ealet is a former commodities trader, like Lloyd Blankfein, the bank’s CEO.

David Solomon — the executive behind the leadership shakeout, and the heir to Blankfein’s throne — was not a trader, and did not come up through the fixed income currencies and commodities business, known as FICC. Several of the executives jockeying for senior roles in the securities business are not traders, either.