Piyush Gupta, the Chief Executive Officer of DBS Group Holdings Limited has been profited with an increase in total remuneration by about 13% for 2022 after its quarterly profit in the fourth half topped estimations on lending gains.
According to the bank’s annual report disclosed on Thursday, Piyush Gupta received about S$5.8 million ($4.3 million) as a cash bonus and a remuneration in the salary of S$1.5 million that kicked into an overall payment of about S$15.4 million for the year 2022. This showed an increase from the old S$13.6 million pay package he received a year ago, as per a comparison made with the previous year’s figures.
Last year, Singapore’s biggest lender witnessed a sharp rise in profit from the growing global interest rates and even declared a certain dividend. Still, stock market volatility directed to a leaner period for deal-making and payments from advising wealthy customers.
In a report, DBS stated that an expanded current and savings account base allowed the company to enjoy higher leverage to growing interest rates than in earlier years.
In the report, Gupta further said that higher rates along with advancements of the bank to transform will assist DBS to maintain a return on equity (ROE) of an additional 15%, barring any unpredictable shocks to the global economy. In the second half of last year, DBS’ ROE rose to a record of 17%.
“At the same time, the restored confidence in financial markets will lead to a significant recovery in our wealth management fee income, which was the major drag on our performance in 2022,” Gupta said.
DBS chairman Peter Seah and Mr Gupta reported in a joint letter that the year 2022 was a “breakout year” for the company with its ROE exceedingly surpassing the previous targets of around 12 per cent to 13 per cent range.
Said Mr Seah and Mr Gupta: “Although we remain watchful, we take heart that our loan pipeline looks healthy. If animal spirits return to markets, we should also see some upside to fee income. Barring any unexpected shocks to the global economy, DBS’ ROE will comfortably be above 15 per cent.”
The company fought against challenges like growing geopolitical tensions, increasing inflation rates and slow demands in Singapore and Hong Kong which are the key markets of DBS. However, DBS positively managed to create “solid financial performance and continued delivery against key scorecard goals”.
