In 2010, an article in Rolling Stone likened the investment bank Goldman Sachs to “a great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity, relentlessly jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money.”The creature it was referring to does exist – it’s not a true squid, but one of their close relatives. But despite its terrifying name and appearance, it’s not a vampire. It doesn’t suck blood. It doesn’t have a “blood funnel”.

In fact, thanks to newly published observations, we now know that the vampire squid is a garbage-eater. It extends living fishing lines from its body to snag a rain of rubbish falling from the surface, getting fat on a menu of faeces and corpses.

The Goldman