Goldman Sachs Buys ETF Firm NEOS for Up to $2.25 Billion, Its Second Options-ETF Deal in a Year

Goldman Sachs Group announced Wednesday it has agreed to acquire NEOS Investments, a Westport, Connecticut-based ETF shop, for as much as $2.25 billion in a cash-and-equity deal, according to the company's own press release.

NEOS runs 19 options-based income ETFs with about $30 billion in assets as of June 30, per Goldman's announcement. Bloomberg data cited by AdvisorHub put the figure slightly higher, around $32 billion. Either way, it's a significant acquisition for a firm founded just four years ago, in 2022.

This is Goldman's second bite at the options-ETF apple. The bank closed a roughly $2 billion purchase of Innovator Capital Management, announced in December 2025, according to crypto.news. Innovator managed $28 billion across 159 ETFs at the time of that deal and specializes in "buffer" or defined-outcome funds, which cap both your losses and your gains over a set period.

NEOS is a different animal. It sells options against index and bond exposure to generate monthly income. Its flagship S&P 500 High Income ETF returned about 19% over the year through June and roughly 15% annualized since inception, according to Reuters. Selling those call options is exactly what caps how much of a market rally reaches shareholders. Reuters was straightforward about that tradeoff. Nobody's getting a free lunch here.

Put the two deals together and Goldman Sachs Asset Management will oversee about $80 billion in active ETFs inside a $130 billion global ETF platform, according to the company's own numbers. That would make Goldman the eighth-largest active ETF provider by assets as of June 30, per Morningstar figures cited in the announcement.

Marc Nachmann, who runs Goldman's asset and wealth management arm, told Bloomberg (via AdvisorHub) that "active ETFs are a fast growing space in the asset-management business." Industry-wide, derivative income ETFs have grown from a niche product to roughly $180 billion in assets, expanding at a compound annual rate above 70% since 2021, according to Morningstar data cited in Goldman's own release.

Goldman's asset and wealth management unit pulled in $4.6 billion in net revenue in the second quarter, up 20% from a year earlier, according to Reuters. Total assets under supervision topped $4 trillion, up more than $700 billion year over year. Wall Street banks have been leaning harder on steady management fees to offset the boom-and-bust nature of trading and investment banking revenue. This deal fits that pattern squarely.

The deal is structured with a final payment tied to performance and service commitments, meaning the full $2.25 billion isn't guaranteed cash on day one, according to crypto.news. Goldman hasn't disclosed the cash-versus-stock split or named which regulators need to sign off. The transaction is expected to close in the first quarter of 2027, pending regulatory approval, according to both InvestmentNews and the Reuters report carried by wmbdradio.

NEOS co-founders Troy Cates and Garrett Paolella will become partners at Goldman Sachs Asset Management once the deal closes, with the rest of the NEOS team expected to join as well, according to multiple sources including Goldman's own announcement.

Options-income ETFs have exploded in popularity because they pay big monthly checks, and retail investors have piled in chasing yield. These funds trade upside for income, and in a strong bull market that tradeoff can quietly cost buy-and-hold investors real money compared to just owning the index. Jefferies analysts, quoted by Reuters, called the move a way to capitalize on "the accelerating adoption of derivative income ETFs" and deepen "durable A&WM revenues" for Goldman. The structure of these products, options sold for income and capped upside, is disclosed in every prospectus. The bigger open question is whether the torrid 70% annual growth rate in this category can survive if markets turn volatile and the income premiums NEOS has been collecting stop covering the downside as smoothly as they have since 2022, a period that has been mostly a bull market.

Goldman's asset management arm has said it remains open to further acquisitions, particularly ones that help it compete with private-markets giants like Blackstone and KKR, according to AdvisorHub. Whether the NEOS deal clears regulators on schedule for a first-quarter 2027 close, and whether the derivative-income ETF boom holds up through a real market downturn, are the two things worth watching next.