Wall Street Banks Retreat on DEI as Backlash Snowballs (1)

Goldman Sachs Group Inc. has made a surprising change to its “Possibilities Summit” for Black college students: It’s opened the program to White students.

At Bank of America Corp., certain internal programs that used to focus on women and minorities have been broadened to include everyone.

And at Bank of New York Mellon Corp., executives are being urged to reconsider hard metrics for workforce diversity. Lose them, lawyers have advised.

This is what diversity, equity and inclusion looks like on Wall Street today: anxious, fraught – and changing fast.

Bank executives are moving to head off accusations of reverse discrimination.

Photographer: Ting Shen/Bloomberg

From C-suites down, American finance is quietly reassessing its promises to level ...