Goldman's Cohn set to chat with wealthy clients

* Wall Street's most powerful firm seeks to repair image

* Goldman: Call is regularly scheduled client event

* Firm is fighting backlash after SEC charges

By Steve Eder

NEW YORK, June 16 (Reuters) - The Goldman Sachs Group Inc (GS.N) charm offensive continues, this time with President Gary Cohn taking part on Wednesday in a conference call with the firm's wealth management customers.

The call with the firm's wealthiest individual clients comes as Wall Street's most powerful firm fights a backlash stemming from its subprime mortgage-linked security business.

Cohn's call would be the latest in a series of meetings with privately wealthy clients. On May 5, Goldman Chief Executive Lloyd Blankfein told those clients that Goldman must deal with the "doubts" surrounding the firm, according to a rebroadcast of the call on CNBC. [ID:nN05150075]

A Goldman spokeswoman said the Cohn call is "a client event and we regularly schedule these types of meetings."

Goldman executives have been acutely aware of the concerns of their clients since the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission charged the firm with civil fraud in connection with its marketing and packaging of the Abacus collateralized debt obligation in 2007. A CDO is a bundle of subprime mortgage-linked securities that are sold to investors in pieces.

Cohn, speaking last week at a regulatory conference in Montreal, told reporters that there is "no indication" a settlement with the SEC is near. [ID:nN10240096]

Blankfein met with former Goldman partners on Tuesday, assuring them that clients are still standing behind the firm, The Wall Street Journal reported. [ID:nSGE65F06H] (Reporting by Steve Eder and Matthew Goldstein, editing by Matthew Lewis)