Five years ago this week, on June 2, 2006, the board of Goldman Sachs announced that it intended to elect Lloyd Blankfein, then president and chief operating officer, as its next chairman and chief executive, to replace Hank Paulson, who was moving upstairs to become US Treasury Secretary.

Blankfein's five years at the helm of Goldman Sachs have been defined by three distinct periods: explosive growth up to early 2008, the ructions of the financial crisis triggered by the collapse of Lehman Brothers, and the bank's tentative recovery since 2009 amid the post-crisis regulatory and reputational fallout.