DBS must bulk up or lose fintech turf in S-E Asia
Sat, Oct 05, 2019 - 5:50 AM
SOUTH-EAST Asia's largest lender happens to be its most tech-savvy. Why then is Singapore's DBS Group Holdings Ltd missing out on some of the region's hottest deals in digital banking?.....
The No 1 challenger is Citigroup.
This week, the US bank won the mandate to issue the first co-branded credit card for South-east Asian e-commerce. Alibaba Group Holding's Lazada operates online stores in Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam. Back in June, ride-share behemoth Grab Holdings announced a similar card partnership. That, too, was snagged by Citi.
This matters intensely. The Internet economy in South-east Asia, a region of nearly 650 million people, is on track to exceed US$100 billion this year before tripling by 2025, according to research released Thursday by Alphabet Inc's Google, Temasek Holdings and Bain & Co Financing.....
DBS has less than S$24 billion in assets in South and South-east Asian markets - mainly comprising Indonesia, India and Malaysia's offshore financial centre at Labuan....
Read more :
https://www.businesstimes.com.sg/opinion...n-s-e-asia
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Investors 'have little choice' but to go to stocks: DBS
Published Oct 4, 2019, 11:57 am SGT
SINGAPORE (BLOOMBERG) - Stocks still look particularly attractive in a world of ultra-low bond yields, according to South-east Asia's largest bank DBS Group Holdings.
Equities are a better risk-reward play than bonds, which are looking expensive after this year's big rally, chief investment officer Hou Wey Fook wrote in his fourth-quarter asset allocation report. He recommends dividend shares and gold as well as hybrid European AT1 securities.....
Dividend stocks are favoured as bond proxies because "the constant dividend stream acts as a volatility dampener", Mr Hou wrote. He likes Singapore real-estate investment trusts, large China banks and European oil majors, he said......
Read more :
https://www.straitstimes.com/business/ba...stocks-dbs