IMPEACH BUSH

The investment bank, along with eight other leading US banks, has been instructed by influential Congressman Henry Waxman to provide the information as part of an investigation into whether taxpayer's money will be used to support remuneration pools.

Mr Waxman's request comes at an awkward moment for Goldman in particular, since it is expected to announce the latest recruits to its 320-strong partnership - each of whom banked in the region of £6m last year in addition to other lucrative benefits.

In his capacity as chairman of the powerful House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, Mr Waxman is interested in bank pay and bonuses as a result of the $125bn (£78bn) the US Treasury will inject into the balance sheets of the nine banks through its Troubled Assets Relief Programme.

Mr Waxman's specific requests include a breakdown on salaries and bonuses and other benefits paid to the ten best paid employees for the last three years.

The Treasury is set to take a $10bn preferred equity stake in Goldman, considerably smaller than the $25bn stakes it will take in Bank of America, Citigroup, JP Morgan Chase and Wells Fargo, however.

In letters to the heads of the each of the nine banks involved, Mr Waxman noted that the banks have accumulated a collected remuneration pool of $108bn for the first nine months of this year, almost the same as last year, in spite of the dire state of the banking sector this year. Goldman's current compensation pool stood at $11.4bn for the nine months to August 31 – and last year totalled $16.92bn, equivalent to $564,000 per employee.

"I question the appropriateness of depleting the capital that taxpayers just injected into the banks through the payment of billions of dollars in bonuses, especially after one of the financial industry's worst years on record," he wrote.

A Goldman Sachs spokesman said: "We look forward to co-operating with Chairman Waxman's request."