Mr. Sparks is not remembered for the Goldman Sachs activities that were brought to mind in April 2016, when Goldman Sachs agreed to pay $5.1 billion as a civil settlement because of its participation in the subprime mortgage market. During that period Goldman Sachs was bundling and selling securities that had been created by companies that specialized in converting subprime loans into bonds and selling them to unsuspecting investors. When the loans went bad, Goldman Sachs was left holding the money it had received from the sale of the bonds, purchasers of the bonds were left holding the bag, and former homeowners went from owning homes to becoming renters or homeless. Mr. Sparks, however, was remembered for something else. During his last 1 1/2 years at Goldman Sachs, Mr. Sparks was involved in creating something called a "synthetic collateralized debt obligation."