SINGAPORE, Sept 1 — In his nearly three decade-stint with Citigroup, banker Piyush Gupta has spent most of his time in Southeast Asia and Hong Kong.
That experience and his Indian background might be just what DBS needs as Southeast Asia’s largest bank looks to expand across Asia.
Gupta, 49 and a keen golfer, was a surprise choice as DBS’s new chief executive, ending a near five month search to replace Richard Stanley, who died of cancer in April. Stanley had also joined DBS from Citi.
A graduate from the prestigious Indian Institute of Management in Ahmedabad, Gupta, who oversees Citi’s operations in Southeast Asia and Australasia, may be better equipped to push DBS’s slow move in the region. He has strong experience in both investment and consumer banking and will take over in November.
“Gupta’s familiarity with the Southeast Asian markets, particularly with Indonesia and Malaysia, suggests there’s a possibility DBS could now concentrate more towards building its franchise in its own backyard,” said CIMB analyst Kenneth Ng.
Gupta is credited with building Citi’s Malaysia branch network and helping Indonesia restructure its debts after the Asian 1997/8 financial crisis, but his track record is not without blemish.
In 2000, at the height of the dotcom bubble, he left Citigroup to head an Internet portal called go4i.com, which subsequently folded despite backing from the private equity arm of Chase Manhattan Bank and one of India’s top media firms.
Gupta is known to have a good grasp of detail and was hands-on, demanding, but easy to work with, said a Citigroup employee, who has worked for him over the last three years.
A permanent resident of Singapore, with his wife and two teenage children, Gupta takes a keen interest in promoting education and advised the Singapore government on revamping primary education.
The Straits Times newspaper said Gupta is in the process of applying for Singapore citizenship.
He was one of Citigroup’s earliest recruits in Asia under the US bank’s management associate programme, and benefited from the bank’s policy of moving people across businesses.
TOUGH TASK
“Mr Gupta will have his work cut out. The key challenges to be dealt with include strengthening the domestic lending business and re-evaluating DBS regional strategy,” said Bank of America-Merrill Lynch analyst Kar Weng Loo.
Gupta will be tasked to reduce DBS’s reliance on Singapore and Hong Kong — ties born from having state investor Temasek as its largest shareholder.
Gupta was relaxed and measured throughout an hour-long interview with Reuters in March while taking questions about Citi’s prospects in the region, at a time when its future was in doubt due to problems in the United States.— Reuters
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