https://www.straitstimes.com/business/dbs-to-sell-majority-stake-in-axs-to-private-equity-firm-tower-capital-asia

SINGAPORE needs to figure out how to better deploy its sizable reserves and leverage its wealthy status by investing more in the region, according to Piyush Gupta, the chief executive officer of the city-state&rsquo s largest bank.
&ldquo We&rsquo ve still not caught up around the fact that we are a rich country,&rdquo the head of DBS Group Holdings, said at a conference titled Reinventing Destiny on Monday (Aug 14). &ldquo We have capital resources, how do we put it to work to create competitive advantage?&rdquo
The financial hub has over the years accumulated a large, undisclosed sum of reserves, which has been estimated at over a trillion US dollars, a figure Gupta referenced in his remarks. Still, authorities have mostly batted off calls for a greater deployment of the pile, especially for welfare payouts. The administration should consider whether to use it to &ldquo address the underbelly of society&rdquo or more importantly, to scale up Singapore&rsquo s presence in new sectors and industries, Gupta said.
It should also consider using capital differently by learning from nations like Japan, and investing long-term in regional countries to get greater solidarity, said Gupta, whose bank is also the largest in South-east Asia. &ldquo Our neighbours think of us as a self-serving country,&rdquo he said.
Gupta, a high-profile figure that has led DBS for over a decade, has weighed in on economic issues in the past, including saying that Singapore can afford to raise taxes on the rich and China&rsquo s common prosperity drive is a good thing. On Monday, he also said that Singapore has become &ldquo more fearful of failure,&rdquo especially now that the wealthy nation has more to lose. Still, the country cannot always be risk-averse due to a fast-changing world, he said.
This view was echoed by former US Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers who attended the same event remotely. &ldquo I wonder how a person with the mixture of traits that Elon Musk has or that Steve Jobs had would function, and would or would not be permitted to flourish in the Singaporean system,&rdquo he said. &ldquo The optimal amount of rule-breaking in a creative society is substantially greater than zero.&rdquo BLOOMBERG

OCBC (SGX:O39)' s management intends to maintain dividend payout ratio at 50% starting 2023, which provides more certainty of a recurrent and stable payout. Management is comfortable with a lower CET-1 CAR of 14.0% and will consider all options for capital management, including special dividends.17 Jul 2023