Goldman Sachs Group AI Visibility Market Strategy Report - Certificates of Deposits

Answer Capsule

Goldman Sachs Group holds strong AI presence in the certificates of deposits category but converts that presence into recommendations at a modest rate. The October 2026 LLM Authority Index benchmark shows a raw mention presence rate of 77.64% against valid recommendation coverage of 13.04%, a gap of 64.6 points. The clearest win is top-three placement, which held at 4.35% in October while presence climbed 13.1 points over the July baseline. The clearest weakness is rank-one placement at 0.62%, and the clearest opportunity is converting high-presence, low-recommendation prompt contexts into shortlist positions.

Who This Report Is For

This report is for Goldman Sachs Group marketing, brand, and digital strategy leaders who need to understand how AI systems describe and recommend the firm in certificates of deposits discovery, and where the gap between visibility and recommendation is widest.

Report Card

Executive Summary

Goldman Sachs Group is visible in AI-generated certificates of deposits recommendations but is not consistently chosen. The October 2026 benchmark recorded a raw mention presence rate of 77.64%, tied with Capital One for the second-highest presence in the tracked set and trailing only JPMorgan Chase & Co. at 79.5%. Valid recommendation coverage, however, sits at 13.04%, placing Goldman Sachs Group fourth in the category behind Capital One, American Express, and Bread Savings.

The gap between presence and recommendation is the defining signal for this brand. Goldman Sachs Group appears in more than three-quarters of qualified observations but receives valid recommendation credit in roughly one in eight. That 64.6-point spread is wider than any other brand in the top half of the category and indicates that AI systems treat the firm as a reference point more often than a shortlist candidate.

Sentiment framing is positive-leaning and clean. The benchmark recorded 23 positive mentions, 102 neutral mentions, and zero negative mentions, producing a net sentiment score of 0.184. The absence of negative framing is a meaningful asset in a category where several competitors carry cautionary or comparison-anchor mentions.

The strongest cluster is the only cluster with qualified data: Best CD Rates and Top Certificate of Deposit Accounts, a consideration-stage cluster. Within that cluster, Goldman Sachs Group holds a top-three rate of 4.35% and a rank-one rate of 0.62%, with an average recommended rank of 3.79 when it receives rank credit.

Platform behavior varies sharply. Google AI Overviews and Gemini carry the largest share of Goldman Sachs Group mentions, while ChatGPT and Copilot surface the brand frequently but convert that presence into recommendations at much lower rates. Gemini shows a moderate recommendation signal, and Perplexity produced the strongest rank-one rate for the brand at 5.9% on a small sample.

The clearest gap is rank-one placement. Goldman Sachs Group received rank-one credit in just one qualified observation out of 161, a 0.62% rate. Competitors including JPMorgan Chase & Co. (3.11%), Bread Savings (5.59%), and Capital One (1.86%) all convert presence into first-position recommendations more effectively.

What Goldman Sachs Group Is Winning

Questions This Section Answers

• How does Goldman Sachs Group's sentiment profile compare with competitors that carry negative mentions?
• On which platform does Goldman Sachs Group achieve its strongest rank-one signal?

Goldman Sachs Group's strongest asset in this benchmark is the absence of negative framing. The dataset recorded zero negative mentions across 125 mentions and 161 qualified observations, a cleaner sentiment profile than JPMorgan Chase & Co., Bank of America Corp., Wells Fargo & Co., Citigroup Inc., and American Express, all of which carry at least one negative mention.

The brand also holds a top-tier presence rate. At 77.64%, Goldman Sachs Group matches Capital One and trails only JPMorgan Chase & Co. at 79.5%. That level of raw visibility means AI systems consistently recognize the firm as a relevant entity in certificates of deposits prompts.

Top-three placement held steady against the July baseline while overall presence climbed. The top-three rate was 4.35% in October, and the recommended top-ten rate reached 8.7%. The brand is being placed in recommendation contexts at roughly the same rate as it was four months ago, even as overall presence increased by 13.1 points.

Perplexity produced the strongest rank-one signal for Goldman Sachs Group, with a 5.9% rank-one rate and an average recommended rank of 1.5 on a small sample. That platform-specific strength suggests the brand can reach first position when the retrieval and synthesis conditions align.

Where Goldman Sachs Group Has the Clearest AI Visibility Gaps

Questions This Section Answers

• Why does Goldman Sachs Group receive so few valid recommendations despite appearing in most observations?
• Which competitors convert a similar or lower presence rate into more recommendations?
• On which platforms does Goldman Sachs Group appear frequently but almost never rank first?

The primary gap is recommendation conversion. Goldman Sachs Group appears in 77.64% of qualified observations but receives valid recommendation credit in only 13.04%. Capital One converts a similar presence rate (77.6%) into 27.3% coverage, more than double Goldman Sachs Group's rate. American Express converts a much lower presence rate (44.7%) into 24.8% coverage. The benchmark evidence suggests that Goldman Sachs Group is being mentioned as context, comparison anchor, or reference entity rather than as a recommended CD issuer.

Rank-one placement is the narrowest gap. Goldman Sachs Group received rank-one credit in one observation, a 0.62% rate. Bread Savings, with a presence rate of only 16.8%, achieved a 5.59% rank-one rate. JPMorgan Chase & Co., with a similar presence rate to Goldman Sachs Group, achieved a 3.11% rank-one rate. The data indicates that when AI systems do recommend Goldman Sachs Group, they rarely place it first.

Platform-level conversion is uneven. On ChatGPT, Goldman Sachs Group appeared in 76.5% of observations but received valid recommendation coverage of 17.6%, with a rank-one rate of 0.0%. On Copilot, presence was 73.9% with recommendation coverage of 13.0% and a rank-one rate of 0.0%. On Google AI Overviews, presence was 77.8% with recommendation coverage of 4.4% and a rank-one rate of 0.0%. These platforms surface the brand frequently but rarely place it at the top of a recommendation list.

The category's only qualified cluster is consideration-stage. No qualified observations fell into pricing and value or multi-brand comparison clusters in October 2026. That means the benchmark cannot yet show how AI systems describe Goldman Sachs Group's CD rates, terms, or value relative to competitors, which limits the diagnostic picture.

Biggest Opportunity

The clearest opportunity for Goldman Sachs Group is converting high-presence, low-recommendation prompt contexts into shortlist positions. The brand already appears in more than three-quarters of qualified observations, so the discovery layer is working. The gap is in the recommendation layer: AI systems are not translating that presence into valid recommendation credit or top-three placement at the rate competitors achieve.

The prompt evidence points to a specific pattern. Prompts such as "What are the 5 major U.S. banks?" and "Which US bank has a free checking account?" surface Goldman Sachs Group frequently but place it in a reference or comparison context rather than a recommendation context. The opportunity is to build the owned answer layer and citation architecture so that AI systems associate Goldman Sachs Group with specific CD attributes, such as rate competitiveness, term flexibility, or trust signals, that trigger recommendation placement rather than neutral mention.

Competitive Landscape

Questions This Section Answers

• Who leads the certificates of deposits category on recommendation-stage metrics?
• Where does Goldman Sachs Group rank on top-three rate compared with its closest competitors?

Capital One holds the strongest recommendation-stage position in the certificates of deposits category, with American Express as the clearest challenger and Bread Savings as the most efficient rank-one converter. Goldman Sachs Group sits in the middle of the field on coverage despite holding top-tier presence, which places it behind three competitors on recommendation conversion.

Average recommended rank covers rank-eligible recommendations only.

Goldman Sachs Group's 4.35% top-three rate places it fourth in the category, tied with JPMorgan Chase & Co. but with a much weaker rank-one rate (0.62% versus 3.11%). The brand's average recommended rank of 3.79 is the second-highest among brands with rank-eligible recommendations, indicating that when Goldman Sachs Group does appear in a recommendation list, it typically lands in the middle or lower portion rather than near the top.

AI Response Inconsistency Alerts

Questions This Section Answers

• What factually conflicting claims do AI platforms make about Goldman Sachs Group's asset ranking?
• Which platforms disagree on whether Goldman Sachs Group belongs among the five major U.S. banks?
• How might these inconsistencies relate to the brand's presence-without-recommendation pattern?

The benchmark detected two critical or high-severity factual inconsistencies involving Goldman Sachs Group across four AI platforms. Both conflicts concern the firm's asset ranking and its membership in the five major U.S. banks, and both carry high confidence scores.

The first conflict concerns Goldman Sachs Group's total assets and ranking among U.S. banks. When asked "top 30 banks in usa," Google AI Overviews stated that Goldman Sachs Group has $751.7 billion in assets and ranks fifth, citing the Federal Reserve, U.S. News & World Report, and Wikipedia. Google AI Mode stated that Goldman Sachs Group has $559.81 billion in assets and ranks sixth, behind PNC, citing Wikipedia, the Federal Reserve, and MX.com. Both platforms cited overlapping sources, including the Federal Reserve and Wikipedia, yet produced incompatible asset figures and rankings for the same period.

The second conflict concerns whether Goldman Sachs Group belongs among the five major U.S. banks by total assets. When asked "What are the 5 major U.S. banks?", ChatGPT stated that Goldman Sachs Group is not among the five largest U.S. banks by assets and may appear only in a different "Big Five" Wall Street list, citing the Federal Reserve and Wikipedia. Copilot stated that Goldman Sachs Group is one of the five major U.S. banks by total assets, citing U.S. News & World Report, Wikipedia, and Forbes. A flagged source excerpt from the Wikipedia list of largest banks in the United States showed Goldman Sachs Group at position five with $2,127 billion in assets, which conflicts with both asset figures cited in the first conflict.

These inconsistencies matter because asset size and major-bank membership are common reference points in certificates of deposits prompts. When AI systems disagree on Goldman Sachs Group's asset ranking, the firm's positioning in comparison and ranking contexts becomes unstable, which may contribute to the presence-without-recommendation pattern observed in the benchmark.

Prompt Evidence

Google AI Overviews / Best CD Rates and Top Certificate of Deposit Accounts Prompt: "What are the 5 major U.S. banks?" Result: Goldman Sachs Group appeared in the response but was placed in a reference context rather than a recommendation context, consistent with the brand's high presence and low recommendation conversion.

ChatGPT / Best CD Rates and Top Certificate of Deposit Accounts Prompt: "What are the 5 major U.S. banks?" Result: ChatGPT stated that Goldman Sachs Group is not among the five largest U.S. banks by assets, directly conflicting with Copilot's response to the same question.

Copilot / Best CD Rates and Top Certificate of Deposit Accounts Prompt: "What are the 5 major U.S. banks?" Result: Copilot included Goldman Sachs Group as one of the five major U.S. banks by total assets, producing a factual conflict with ChatGPT on the same prompt.

Perplexity / Best CD Rates and Top Certificate of Deposit Accounts Prompt: "Which US bank has a free checking account?" Result: Goldman Sachs Group received rank-one credit in this prompt context, contributing to the brand's 5.9% rank-one rate on Perplexity, the strongest platform-level rank-one signal for the firm.

What CiteWorks Studio Would Do Next

Phase 1: AI Visibility Market Discovery Audit Map the specific prompt contexts where Goldman Sachs Group appears but is not recommended, and identify which competitors capture the recommendation credit in those contexts.

Phase 2: Recommendation Readiness Plan Prioritize the prompt themes and platforms where the presence-to-recommendation gap is widest, starting with ChatGPT and Copilot, where the brand appears frequently but receives near-zero rank-one credit.

Phase 3: Owned Answer Layer Buildout Develop owned content that associates Goldman Sachs Group with specific CD attributes, such as rate competitiveness, term structure, and trust signals, so AI systems have clear recommendation triggers to retrieve.

Phase 4: Citation / Authority Layer Development Strengthen the public evidence layer by ensuring accurate, consistent asset and ranking data is available across the financial comparison and reference sources that AI systems cite most often in this category.

Phase 5: Monthly AI Visibility and Recommendation Tracking Track recommendation coverage, top-three rate, and rank-one rate month over month to measure whether the presence-to-recommendation gap is closing.

Why This Matters

Questions This Section Answers

• Why isn't high AI presence enough to convert into recommendations for Goldman Sachs Group?
• Which layers of the recommendation signal need correction to close the gap?

AI presence alone is not enough. Goldman Sachs Group already appears in more than three-quarters of qualified certificates of deposits observations, but that visibility is not converting into recommendation credit at the rate competitors achieve. In a category where AI systems are increasingly the first stop for buyers comparing CD issuers, being mentioned is not the same as being shortlisted.

The next move is targeted correction of the prompt, page, and citation layers. The benchmark shows where Goldman Sachs Group is visible but under-recommended. Closing that gap requires building the owned answer layer and citation architecture that give AI systems clear, consistent reasons to place the firm in a recommendation position rather than a reference position.

Core Metrics

Sentiment Score

Sentiment Score = (positive mentions × 1 + neutral mentions × 0 + negative mentions × -1) / total mentions

For Goldman Sachs Group in October 2026: (23 × 1 + 102 × 0 + 0 × -1) / 125 = 0.184.

This score matters because unclassified mention counts are misleading. A brand that appears frequently but is described neutrally is not in the same position as a brand that appears frequently and is described positively. Goldman Sachs Group's score of 0.184 reflects a predominantly neutral framing profile with a positive lean and no negative mentions, which is a cleaner position than several competitors but a weaker positive signal than Bread Savings (0.96) or American Express (0.56).

Share of voice is a diagnostic metric, not a business KPI. A positive recommendation, a neutral reference, a cautionary mention, and a competitor-displaced mention are not equal. Counting all mentions as wins is bad measurement. Classified sentiment is required before interpreting AI visibility, because a brand with 125 mentions and a 0.184 sentiment score is in a different position than a brand with 125 mentions and a 0.96 sentiment score.

Sentiment by Platform

Methodology

1. Report orientation: This is a benchmark-based AI Visibility Company Market Strategy Report for Goldman Sachs Group in the certificates of deposits category, derived from the LLM Authority Index October 2026 measurement and supporting CiteWorks Studio analysis.
2. Reporting window: October 2026, with July 2026 as the baseline comparison month.
3. Platforms tracked: ChatGPT, Copilot, Gemini, Perplexity, Google AI Mode, and Google AI Overviews.
4. Observation count: 161 qualified benchmark observations in October 2026, down from 203 in July 2026.
5. Competitor universe: Ten tracked brands including Goldman Sachs Group, Capital One, American Express, Bread Savings, Citigroup Inc., Morgan Stanley, JPMorgan Chase & Co., Bank of America Corp., Wells Fargo & Co., and U.S. Bancorp.
6. Public clusters used: One qualified cluster, Best CD Rates and Top Certificate of Deposit Accounts (consideration stage). Pricing and value and multi-brand comparison clusters recorded no qualified observations in October 2026.
7. Stage 0 role: The benchmark retains prompt-level observations covering query, AI surface, answer, brand outcome, recommendation placement, sentiment, and citations where exposed. Source presence is evidence about the information environment, not proof of causation.
8. Definition of a mention: A brand appears in any form within a qualified observation, whether as a recommendation, reference, comparison anchor, or contextual mention.
9. Definition of a valid recommendation: A brand appears in a valid recommendation context, as marked by the dataset. Neutral, cautionary, comparison-anchor, and listed-only mentions are not counted as valid recommendations unless the dataset explicitly marks them as such.
10. Limitations: The qualified denominator fell to 161 observations in October 2026 from 211 in September 2026, which changes the weight each observation carries. Several movements, including U.S. Bancorp at 1.2% and Bank of America Corp. at 2.5%, come from small absolute counts. The tracked entity list has alternated between common and formal brand names across the series, which affects month-over-month attribution for some brands. Movement between months identifies changes worth investigating; it does not by itself establish what caused those changes.
11. Ranking interpretation: Average recommended rank covers rank-eligible recommendations only. Rank-one rate reflects the share of qualified observations where the brand is the single top recommendation.
12. Dataset normalization: Brand-level percentages use the qualified observations as the public denominator, not the raw collection of 800 prompt-surface observations.

See How AI Is Recommending Your Brand

The public benchmark shows where Goldman Sachs Group is visible and where it is under-recommended in certificates of deposits discovery. A company-level AI visibility audit maps the specific prompt, platform, competitor, and citation patterns behind those numbers, and turns the benchmark signal into a prioritized plan for closing the presence-to-recommendation gap.