Helen Wong, CEO of Singapore’s Oversea-Chinese Banking Corp. (OCBC), is eager to talk about AI—and argues that, contrary to fears that roles will be automated away, the new technology will “create more jobs.”
“I love the topic [of] AI,” Wong said on a call with analysts. She revealed that the bank has built its own internal AI system used for coding and ranking work, and claimed the investment has helped its coders work 20% faster.
OCBC is also building engineering hubs in the Chinese cities of Shanghai and Shenzhen, and expanding its existing hub in Indonesia.
“AI creates more jobs,” Wong suggested, giving the example of hiring more employees to assist engineers adding new features to ATMs. Other employees beyond engineering staff are involved in using AI to “make processes better,” she explained. Wong added that the bank will invest in its employees to ensure they stay relevant amid new technology advances.
On Monday, DBS CEO Piyush Gupta suggested that the bank might gradually cut 4,000 temporary roles over the next few years owing to AI. Research suggests that AI could lead to hundreds of thousands of lost jobs across the entire global banking industry.
OCBC earnings
OCBC, ranked No. 12 on the Fortune Southeast Asia 500, is the last of Singapore’s Big Three banks to report its quarterly results.
Similar to DBS and UOB, OCBC said it will return a sizable amount of capital to shareholders on the back of its record earnings. The bank plans to return 2.5 billion Singapore dollars ($1.9 billion) over two years through special dividends and share buybacks.
OCBC’s full-year profit hit a record 7.6 billion Singapore dollars ($5.6 billion), an 8% year-on-year increase. Net interest income and higher wealth management and insurance fees drove profit growth.
Yet OCBC missed analyst estimates on quarterly profits for December. Net profit for the final three months of the year rose 4% year on year to hit 1.7 billion Singapore dollars ($1.3 billion), below the consensus of 1.81 billion Singapore dollars from analysts polled by the London Stock Exchange Group.
OCBC’s profit growth also lagged its competitors DBS and UOB, whose quarterly profits rose by 10% and 9%, respectively.
The bank’s shares are down about 1.9% as of 4 p.m. Singapore time.