DBS CEO Piyush Gupta nets $3.4m after selling 100,000 shares in the bank

SINGAPORE — DBS Group Holdings chief executive Piyush Gupta has sold 100,000 shares in the bank, netting him around $3.4 million, according to documents filed with the Singapore Exchange on Tuesday (Aug 8).

Mr Gupta sold 8,100 shares at $34.32 each and 91,900 shares at $34.2553 each in two separate open market transactions on Friday. Together, the shares sold accounted for 4.4 per cent of his DBS holdings.

He still owns 0.085 per cent, or 2,185,721, of the ordinary shares in DBS, under a trust arrangement. 

Mr Gupta sold his shares a day after DBS trounced forecasts to announce a record $2.69 billion in net profit for the second quarter of 2023.

This was up 48 per cent from a year ago, driven by a jump in net interest margin, Mr Gupta told reporters during DBS' results briefing on Thursday.

Growth was also supported by higher fee income at the bank's commercial, wealth management and cards businesses.

However, Mr Gupta had also warned that the banking sector could be looking at weaker loan growth in 2023 due to economic uncertainty and high interest rates.

He now expects the bank's loan book to grow at a "low single-digit percentage" for the year, compared with his first-quarter forecast of three per cent to five per cent, and before that, mid-single-digit growth.

DBS' board also declared a dividend of 48 cents a share for the second quarter, which is an increase of six cents a share from the previous quarter and in line with the bank's guidance for a baseline annual dividend increase of 24 cents a share.

Shares of DBS were trading unchanged at $34.35 as at 11.22am on Tuesday.

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This article was first published in The Straits Times. Permission required for reproduction.