Quietly earning 30 billion! CITIC Securities' mysterious business growth exceeds 200%, with proprietary trading becoming the strongest money printer.

Ask AI · How can proprietary business leverage AI technology to improve investment efficiency?

Produced by｜China Interview Network

Reviewed by｜Li Xiaoyan

On the evening of March 26, Citic Securities, well known as the “brokerage industry’s top man,” officially disclosed its 2025 annual report. This scorecard delivered at a critical milestone—thirty years since the company’s founding—showcases the industry leader’s solid staying power and development momentum. The annual report shows that Citic Securities’ 2025 revenue and net profit both hit record highs, with growth across core businesses. Its proprietary business continued to gain momentum and became a “profit stabilizer.” Meanwhile, the emerging businesses posted astonishing growth. In areas including wealth management, equity investment, and cross-border business, the company made breakthroughs on multiple fronts. Not only did it deliver its best-ever performance results, but it also used its strong overall capabilities to further cement its leading position in the industry, setting an example for the high-quality development of the securities industry.

Performance hits historical highs Revenue and net profit rise together, highlighting hard-core strength

In 2025, Citic Securities’ operating performance achieved a leap forward, with multiple key financial indicators setting new records in the company’s history. According to the annual report, the company generated full-year operating revenue of 74.854 billion yuan, up 28.79% year over year. Net profit attributable to shareholders of the parent company for the first time exceeded 30 billion yuan, reaching 30.076 billion yuan, up sharply by 38.58% year over year. The rate of profit growth far outpaced the rate of revenue growth, reflecting the company’s continuously improving profitability efficiency and ongoing optimization of operating quality.

In terms of asset scale, Citic Securities continued to expand steadily. By the end of 2025, the company’s total assets reached 2.08 trillion yuan, up 21.70% from the end of the prior year, successfully moving into the 2-trillion-yuan asset tier. Shareholders’ equity attributable to shareholders of the parent company was 319.93 billion yuan, up 9.15% from the beginning of the year, further strengthening capital strength and increasing both risk-resilience and business expansion capabilities in tandem. From a quarterly perspective, the company’s performance showed balanced growth momentum. In the third quarter, driven by strong business performance, it achieved operating revenue of 23.019 billion yuan and net profit of 9.621 billion yuan—both the highest figures among all single quarters for the year—demonstrating strong operating resilience and market adaptability.

值得关注的是，在业绩高增长的同时，中信证券盈利能力指标持续优化，基本每股收益1.96元，同比增长39.01%；加权平均净资产收益率10.59%，同比提升2.50个百分点，股东回报能力显著增强，充分体现了公司高效的资产运营水平与出色的盈利能力。

Proprietary business becomes a “money printer” With diversified business segments blooming everywhere

As one of the core profit segments for brokerages, Citic Securities’ securities investment (proprietary) business stood out exceptionally in 2025, becoming a key engine driving performance growth. According to the annual report, the company’s securities investment business generated revenue of 27.605 billion yuan for the full year, up 14.83%. The revenue scale ranked first among all its principal businesses, earning it the label of the company’s “proprietary money printer.”

In terms of proprietary investment strategy, Citic Securities adheres to a balanced approach of stability and innovation. By strengthening multi-asset allocation and iterating across multiple strategies, it continuously enhances trading capabilities in bonds, foreign exchange, commodities, and various FICC derivatives. For equity and alternative investment businesses, it focuses on large-capacity, multi-strategy, and low-volatility objectives, building a platform-based system and optimizing asset allocation. Meanwhile, the company closely tracks market trends, focuses on the fundamentals of listed companies, increases allocations to large blue-chip companies across the Shanghai-Shenzhen-Hong Kong market, and lays out high-quality industry investments aligned with the direction of new quality productive forces. It also integrates artificial intelligence technology into investment strategies, builds a cross-border investment platform in Hong Kong, and, leveraging professional investment capability and precise market judgment, has achieved steady profitability in its proprietary business.

Beyond proprietary business, Citic Securities’ various traditional core businesses also recorded steady growth, forming an overall positive development pattern. As the revenue cornerstone, brokerage services achieved full-year revenue of 20.787 billion yuan, up 25.55%. Backed by its large customer base and high-quality service system, it continued to solidify its industry-leading position. Asset management business generated revenue of 14.294 billion yuan, up 24.59%, with continuously improving active management capabilities and a steadily完善ed product体系. Securities underwriting showed strong performance, achieving revenue of 6.055 billion yuan, up 50.12% year over year—further strengthening the leading advantages of the investment banking segment.

特别值得一提的是，公司“其他业务”成为最大增长亮点，全年实现收入61.13亿元，同比暴涨203.38%，成为业绩增长的新引擎。这一业务的高速增长，既体现了中信证券业务布局的前瞻性与多元化，也展现了公司挖掘新兴业务增长点、拓宽盈利渠道的强大能力，为长期发展注入新活力。

Strategic deployment delivers precise momentum Wealth management and equity investment achieve dual breakthroughs

While core businesses sustained steady growth, Citic Securities focused on long-term strategy and made continued in-depth efforts in key areas such as wealth management and equity investment, achieving breakthrough progress and strengthening the long-term foundation for business development.

Wealth management, as a key focus of the company’s long-term strategy, saw rapid development in 2025 aided by favorable conditions in China’s A-share market. By year-end, Citic Securities’ wealth management system held financial product assets of over 800 billion yuan, with a cumulative customer count exceeding 17 million accounts, up 10% from the end of the prior year. Custody customer assets surpassed 1.5 trillion yuan, up 24% year over year. Both the number of customers and the scale of assets grew significantly. The addition of millions of new customers and trillions of yuan in custody assets built a solid foundation for wealth management business, providing continuing growth momentum for brokerage, asset management, and other businesses.

In the field of equity investment, Citic Securities’ private equity platform—CITIC Goldstone—performed exceptionally well. In 2025, it increased efforts in developing financial investors, added and implemented acquisition strategies by establishing acquisition funds, and completed备案 of new funds totaling 11.05 billion yuan during the year. The company closely followed national strategic directions, focusing on hard technology and long-term value investing, and laid out key areas of new quality productive forces such as embodied intelligence, semiconductor equipment, domestically produced GPUs, and domestically produced servers—helping support scientific and technological self-reliance and self-strengthening. At the same time, its real estate investment platform cumulatively established real estate private investment funds of approximately 43.366 billion yuan. In 2025, it added 4.3 billion yuan in new filings, with a key focus on shopping malls and affordable rental housing, achieving a balance between financial returns and social responsibility.

In investment banking, Citic Securities continued to lead the industry. In 2025, it completed 72 A-share lead underwritings, with an underwriting amount of 270.646 billion yuan and a market share of 24.36%, maintaining the number one position in the industry. Among them, the 2025 STAR Market IPO of Moer Thread—underwritten as an exclusive sponsor—became the largest IPO by offering size on the STAR Market in 2025. Additionally, the company also ranked among the top performers in areas such as Hong Kong stock IPOs, underwriting of onshore/offshore RMB (as well as middle entity offshore) bonds, and cross-border M&A. It completed multiple major M&A and restructuring projects, including the China State Shipbuilding Corporation’s share swap and absorption merger with China CSSC Heavy Industries, fully demonstrating top-tier professional investment banking capabilities and market influence.

Shareholder returns set a record Steady operations provide long-term protection

As a responsible industry leader, Citic Securities has always attached great importance to shareholder returns, and in 2025 it also set the highest dividend payout record since the company’s founding. The company continues the interim + annual cash dividend model. In 2025, its interim dividend paid 2.90 yuan per 10 shares. At year-end, it plans to pay 4.10 yuan per 10 shares. For the full year, the total planned dividend will be 7.00 yuan per 10 shares (including tax), with total cash dividends reaching 10.374 billion yuan, up nearly 35%. Since its A-share listing in 2003, Citic Securities has paid cash dividends for 24 consecutive years, with cumulative dividends exceeding 93 billion yuan—returning value to investors with real cash. This fully reflects the company’s steady operating philosophy and its high regard for shareholder value.

Facing phased challenges brought by market volatility, Citic Securities, relying on a comprehensive risk-control system and flexible operating strategies, effectively mitigated external pressure and achieved steady overall performance growth. Although indicators such as foreign exchange conversion business and operating cash flow experienced phased pressure due to market fluctuations, the company’s core business still maintained a strong growth trend. The fair value change profit narrowed losses compared with the prior year. Overall operating risk remains controllable, and its development foundation is becoming more solid.

Over three decades of progress, Citic Securities, with its impressive 2025 annual report as a new starting point, has continued to strengthen its industry-leading position through a fully leading business layout, strong profitability, a solid customer foundation, and forward-looking strategic vision. In the future, the company will continue to align closely with the goal of building a strong financial country, deepen its core businesses, innovate its development models, and continue to drive efforts in serving the real economy, supporting technological innovation, and promoting an upgrade in wealth management—writing a new chapter in the high-quality development of the securities industry.