Harvey M. Schwartz, who will succeed David A. Viniar as Goldman Sachs Group Inc.'s chief financial officer in January, learned early in his career about tough times on Wall Street.

The 6-foot-4 Rutgers University graduate watched tears stream down the face of a middle-aged colleague as the stock market crashed on Oct. 19, 1987. Two years later, he was working at Citicorp when the bank cut thousands of jobs.

Schwartz wasn't deterred. After 15 years at Goldman Sachs, most recently as co-head of global securities, he was tapped to replace the longest-serving CFO of any major Wall Street firm. The job will make Schwartz, 48, one of the most visible executives at the fifth-biggest U.S. bank by assets as it cuts costs and grapples with weak economic growth and regulatory changes that pushed first-half revenue to the lowest since 2005.