Singapore bank giant DBS cuts executive bonuses over digital outages

Piyush Gupta, chief executive officer of DBS Group Holdings.

authored by Mariko Dude

journalist for company

Despite posting record earnings, the boss of Singapore’s largest bank, DBS, had his prize reduced by 30 % as a result of service disruptions.

Piyush Gupta’s variable pay has been reduced to S$ 4.14 million ($ 3.1 million, £2.4 million ), according to the company, and his full 2023 salary will be made public in March.

Mr. Gupta was paid S$ 15.4 million in 2022.

The nation’s central bank forbade DBS from purchasing new organizations or making non-essential IT changes for six months after a number of bugs next year.

Digital pay services and funds equipment went offline as a result of the disruptions throughout the city-state.

DBS apologized and made plans to increase the resilience of its devices known at the time.

The bank announced in its most recent statement that more junior employees would receive a one-off reward to help them with higher living expenses, while other individuals of its management team would have their variable pay reduced by 21 %.

Variable pay from DBS consists of both a dollars bonus and delayed stock. It is typically based on an employee’s performance and comes on top of basic give.

The bank posted annual record earnings, with its 2023 net profit rising by 26 % to S$ 13. billion, despite the cuts to senior DBS executives ‘ pay.

DBS has benefited from higher interest rates because central bankers have maintained the cost of borrowing in an effort to contain rising costs, like many other businesses around the world.

Following the earnings statement on Wednesday morning, the company’s shares were trading about 2.7 % higher.

Since November 2009, Mr. Gupta has served as the CEO of DBS.

The company has expanded its operations in China’s peninsula, Taiwan, and India under his direction.

Additionally, it has grown to become one of Asia’s largest money management companies.