THERE will no more retrenchments at DBS Group Holdings despite the worsening economic conditions, promised chairman Koh Boon Hwee yesterday.

'No, DBS will not have to do any more of that,' said Mr Koh in response to a question on further job cuts. 'The job of management is to have some foresight. We saw the deterioration coming, we acted early, we are done, we are not going to do any more of this,' said Mr Koh. He was speaking to reporters on the sidelines of a client event.

DBS stunned the market last November when it axed about 900 employees or 6 per cent of its total work force, the bank's biggest ever retrenchment exercise.

More than half of the cuts were from Singapore, while the rest were from Hong Kong and elsewhere.

The bank was also rapped by labour leader Lim Swee Say who said it should have consulted its staff union on the retrenchment of workers or consider other cost-cutting options first.

Job losses have been increasing since the last quarter, in line with the deteriorating economy, but not at an alarming rate. Economists are expecting more workers to be axed after the Chinese New Year.

The government, noting job growth had already started to ease in the second half of last year, has warned that unemployment in 2009 would exceed last year's 2.1 per cent - and layoffs could hit the 30,000 figure seen in the 1998 Asian financial crisis.

Private-sector economists are more downbeat and said more than 30,000 workers will be axed. HSBC sees the jobless rate rising to 3.8 per cent, while Citigroup, HR Business Solutions and CIMB-GK say it could go way past 2003's high of 4 per cent to 5 per cent.

Credit Suisse went even further and has predicted that an astonishing 300,000 jobs could be lost in Singapore this year and next. Most of those likely to lose jobs would be foreigners, who would then have to leave the country, leading to a drop in Singapore's population, it said.

This article was first published in The Business Times on January 23, 2009.