DBS Group chief executive Piyush Gupta saw his annual earnings climb 13.2 per cent to SGD 15.4 million last year as South-East Asia's biggest bank posted record profit and return on equity (ROE), according to a media report.

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Gupta's 2022 pay consisted of a salary of SGD 1.5 million, a cash bonus of SGD 5.77 million and deferred remuneration in cash and shares of SGD 8.04 million, reported The Straits Times. A non-cash component " comprising club, car and driver benefits " worth SGD 80,529 was also part of his pay package, according to the bank's annual report released on Thursday.

The bank last month reported a 20 per cent surge in net profit to SGD 8.19 billion, with earnings driven by higher interest rates. It also achieved a return on equity (ROE) of 15 per cent, up from 12.5 per cent in 2021.

Gupta's total compensation in 2021 was SGD 13.6 million, a 48 per cent jump from 2020 when his pay fell 24 per cent to SGD 9.2 million during the worst of the Covid-19 pandemic.

In a joint letter in the annual report, DBS chairman Peter Seah and Gupta said that 2022 was a "breakout year" for DBS, with its ROE significantly surpassing previous highs of around 12 to 13 per cent range.

Against the backdrop of challenges like escalating geopolitical tensions, high inflation and slowing external demand in its key markets Singapore and Hong Kong, DBS said that it managed to produce "solid financial performance and continued delivery against key scorecard goals".

"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 joint letter said.

In the annual report, Gupta said that DBS needs to continue strengthening its technology in areas such as cloud computing and site reliability engineering to improve scalability, automation and speed to market.
DBS has been undergoing digitalisation since 2017. Over the past five years, digitally engaged customers brought in more than twice the income on average than non-digital customers and cost less to serve, said Gupta.

In 2022, DBS also collaborated with the Monetary Authority of Singapore on two trial applications. One was to trade tokenised assets and the other was to distribute purpose-bound vouchers using programmable money and retail central bank digital currencies.

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