Trillion-dollar giant's "Service Year" theory of growth! Exclusive interview with Ping An China's Co-CEO Guo Xiaotao: Where does the growth potential come from

Ask AI · How can Ping An drive growth by empowering services through its “Service Year” strategy?

Source: The Times Weekly; Author: Huang Jiaxiang

“High-value growth, service innovation, technology leadership, and legal compliance.” After China Ping An (601318.SH; 02318.HK) concluded its 2025 annual results press conference on March 27, the company’s co-CEO, Guo Xiaotao, summed up Ping An’s 2026 operating principles in these sixteen characters in an exclusive interview with a reporter from The Times Weekly, and also regarded them as a summary of Ping An’s 2025 performance.

2025 was the year with the strongest sense of crisis in Ping An’s 37-year history, the year in which strategic implementation went deepest, and the year in which the intensity of service upgrades was greatest. And the performance results Ping An ultimately delivered validate the growth resilience that came from self-imposed pressure.

According to the annual report, in 2025, China Ping An achieved operating profit attributable to shareholders of RMB 134.415 billion, up 10.3%; net profit attributable to shareholders excluding non-recurring gains and losses of RMB 143.773 billion, up 22.5%; operating revenue of RMB 1,050.506 billion, up 2.1%; and net assets for the first time surpassed RMB 1 trillion, reaching RMB 10,004.19 billion, up 7.7% from the beginning of the year.

This also marks the first time in 5 years that Ping An’s operating profit attributable to shareholders has returned to two-digit growth. A research report from CITIC Securities believes that Ping An’s earnings inflection point has been confirmed again. This inflection point shows that Ping An’s growth is no longer simply about pursuing scale and profit, but about high-quality, resilient, and sustainable development quality.

At present, Ping An’s total assets have surpassed RMB 13 trillion, making it the insurance group with the largest global asset base. Its narrative focus has become more deeply oriented toward “sustainability,” “balance,” and “customer focus” through deep, customer-centered operations. During the one-hour interview, Guo Xiaotao repeatedly mentioned keywords such as high quality, resilience, sustainability, and balance. He told a reporter from The Times Weekly that in 2025, Ping An’s performance indicators across all lines of business improved comprehensively; scale and profits achieved high-quality growth. Ping An’s life insurance channel and product structure became more balanced, which can more effectively withstand market fluctuations and make performance more resilient and sustainable.

Deepening the construction of the service system is a key keyword for Ping An’s 2026 development. In the chairman’s address of the annual report, China Ping An’s chairman, Ma Mingzhe, defined 2026 as the “Ping An Service Year.” Guo Xiaotao said that building the service system is a very important strategic direction for Ping An in its fourth decade. Especially as traditional financial business models face product homogenization—insurance products can be easily imitated, but the service system cannot be replicated—Ping An will use “finance + services” to build a differentiated competitive advantage.

Guo Xiaotao told a reporter from The Times Weekly that this year will continue to deepen the layout in the areas of medical care, elderly care, and health services; build a global urgent rescue service system; launch “Home Elderly Care 2.0”; and use AI to create a super entry point for serving service customers. These are all initiatives to further deepen Ping An’s service system.

With earnings rebounding and the strategy continuing to upgrade, the market is now revaluing the value of this financial giant.

“In recent years, Ping An has continued to optimize its asset structure and reduce exposures in risk areas, making the asset structure healthier.” Guo Xiaotao said. The effectiveness of Ping An’s technology-driven “comprehensive financial services + medical and elderly care” strategy—whether in financial indicators, customer experience, or future development trends—gives investors stronger confidence. Ping An’s share price achieved a solid increase last year, and we believe there is still room for further upside in the future.

Co-CEO of China Ping An, Guo Xiaotao. Image source: China Ping An

Earnings reach an inflection point; balanced development is key

China Ping An is entering an earnings inflection point.

After the year 2020, when the growth rate of operating profit attributable to shareholders fell below two digits, China Ping An only returned to two-digit growth in 2025. In an interview with a reporter from The Times Weekly, Guo Xiaotao summarized Ping An’s 2025 performance with “high-value growth.” In his view, Ping An’s businesses improved across the board, and the growth has high quality, resilience, and sustainability.

The financial results show that China Ping An’s new business value for life insurance and health insurance was RMB 36.897 billion, up 29.3%; the new business value rate was 28.5%, up 5.8 percentage points year over year. Ping An’s P&C original premium income was RMB 343.168 billion, up 6.6%; the combined ratio (COR) was 96.8%, improving by 1.5 percentage points. Insurance fund investment performance was excellent. The technology-enabled business segment (formerly the technology segment) turned from losses to profits, and the asset management business reduced losses significantly by 68%.

After years of reform, Ping An’s life insurance channels and products are moving into a balanced development stage. In Guo Xiaotao’s view, balanced development can better withstand market volatility, making growth more resilient and sustainable.

In 2025, the year-over-year growth rate of new business value through Ping An’s agency channel was 10.4%, and the year-over-year growth rate of new business value per capita was 17.2%; new business value through the bancassurance channel grew 138.0% year over year. The contribution share of new business value to Ping An’s life insurance from the bancassurance channel, community financial services, and other channels increased by 12.1 percentage points year over year.

Guo Xiaotao introduced that Ping An’s life insurance channel structure is balanced, which can effectively resist the impact of market volatility on performance. The agency channel continues to move forward on the path of high-quality transformation and is increasingly improving. Per-capita productivity continues to rise; the share of top-performing agents continues to be optimized; the team’s fighting strength is getting stronger, providing sustained momentum for market competition. The company is also vigorously cultivating community financial channels. With a balanced channel layout, Ping An can seize new opportunities in the market in a timely manner, so growth momentum keeps flowing.

In 2025, Ping An’s bancassurance channel performed outstandingly, driving high growth in life insurance new business value, and the sustainability of this high growth has also drawn market attention.

Guo Xiaotao said that within Ping An’s system, a mature bancassurance business management and development model has already been formed, covering areas such as sales-team management, product design, expense management, and middle/back-end system construction. This model has been running well in Ping An’s banking system; both per-capita productivity and branch performance are leading in the industry.

“We now need to readjust this model, replicate it and promote it to banking systems that are not Ping An, and finally form a differentiated management model and playbook.” Guo Xiaotao said. This is precisely why Ping An maintains a relatively high profit margin and value ratio in the highly competitive bancassurance market. With this model and differentiated playbook, it is believed that in 2026 and 2027, the bank channel will still maintain relatively high profit margin levels.

The rapid growth of bancassurance channels also partially reflects the trend of “deposit migration.” According to estimates from multiple institutions, in 2026, more than tens of trillions of yuan of time deposits will mature in a concentrated manner. In a low interest rate environment, households’ asset allocation faces marginal adjustments.

Guo Xiaotao told a reporter from The Times Weekly that low interest rates will last for quite a long period of time, and life insurance is entering a golden development period. Compared with bank five-year deposit rates, many customers will treat life insurance products as an important option for long-term household asset allocation. This will strongly promote the development of life insurance. Under the deposit migration trend, both Ping An’s life insurance market share and the expansion of the bancassurance channel capture a considerable inflow of funds, thereby significantly promoting the company’s growth in performance.

“What we care more about is how, under this trend, we can further enhance the competitiveness of each channel, so that all three channels in balanced development can seize opportunities when customers shift their household asset allocation strategy.” Guo Xiaotao said. Whether it is deepening the management model for the bancassurance channel, optimizing the productivity structure of individual agent teams, or the sustained high growth of community grid business, all of these will help Ping An seize this opportunity.

Ping An’s product structure is also moving toward balanced development, and in 2026 it will intensify its layout of protection-oriented products. Guo Xiaotao said that maintaining balanced development is a major principle of Ping An’s product strategy. From the overall product structure, the current proportion and structure of participating dividend-based insurance are consistent with Ping An’s strategic development direction. In 2026, while maintaining the structure of participating dividend-based insurance, Ping An will further increase the proportion of protection-oriented products, covering medical insurance, health insurance, critical illness insurance, and more. This will be an important shift in and strategic deployment of the company’s product strategy.

Investing through cycles, and finding certainty amid uncertainty

In a low interest rate environment, China Ping An is accelerating its pace of allocating to equity assets. Since 2025, it has taken stakes in several bank and insurance H shares, and its comprehensive investment return ratio has hit the highest value in nearly five years.

As of the end of 2025, the scale of China Ping An’s insurance fund investment portfolio was RMB 6.49 trillion, up 13.2% from the beginning of the year. In 2025, the insurance fund investment portfolio achieved a comprehensive investment return ratio of 6.3%, up 0.5 percentage points year over year. The book value of equity assets was RMB 9,580.89 billion, up 119.05% compared with the end of 2024.

The financial report shows that about 57% of Ping An’s equity investments—FVTOCI stock gains—are not included in net profit. This portion is expected to contribute pre-tax floating gains of more than RMB 90 billion, which are not recognized in profit but are recorded in the balance sheet, directly strengthening net assets.

Since 2026, volatility in the capital markets has intensified, and Ping An’s asset allocation strategy has attracted increasing attention.

At the performance briefing, Guo Xiaotao responded that China Ping An is long-term capital and patient capital. During the investment process, short-term volatility is not important to Ping An; what matters more is how to go through cycles and provide long-term, steady, and sustainable returns for customers and shareholders. He emphasized that Ping An’s investments should closely integrate with the liability side, achieving “five matches”: duration matching, cost matching, product matching, matching with the economic cycle, and matching with regulatory requirements.

Guo Xiaotao further noted in an interview that in a low interest rate environment, investment return ratios will be affected to some extent, but it can also effectively reduce the cost of liabilities. From the liability side, in 2025 and 2026, Ping An’s participating dividend-based insurance product mix will continue to increase. It is estimated that the industry’s participating dividend-based insurance ratio this year will reach 80%—90%. In such a scenario, liability-asset matching differs from traditional insurance: it needs to share investment returns with customers. Therefore, Ping An will be more flexible and agile in seizing investment opportunities in the market.

Guo Xiaotao said that although capital markets have been volatile this year, Ping An believes that the overall trend of China’s capital markets for the full year is positive. Over the past 10 years, Ping An has achieved an average net investment return ratio of over 4.5%, exceeding the 4% long-term investment return assumption. Maintaining this achievement for 10 years is truly not easy.

“We are more concerned not about the absolute value of the investment return ratio, but about the difference between the investment return ratio and the cost of liabilities. In a phase when interest rates fall, it is necessary to ensure that the midstream difference remains stable, reducing volatility, so as to achieve long-term steady investment returns. That is the core key point.” Guo Xiaotao said.

When discussing this year’s core investment approach, Guo Xiaotao said that the task is to seek certainty amid uncertainty. Guo Xiaotao pointed out that as long-cycle patient capital, Ping An’s investments must be fully aligned with the direction of national economic development. New-quality productive forces, infrastructure, medical care, health, elderly care, and other factors are all certainties in national economic development, and they are also important directions guiding Ping An’s long-term investment and asset allocation.

Gold is also part of Ping An’s asset allocation. Guo Xiaotao said that since the beginning of last year, Ping An has allocated a certain amount to gold investments, and current investment returns have achieved expected results. In the future, Ping An will place gold within the allocation framework across the overall set of investment asset classes, and will continue to closely track its trend.

“Service Year”: How do the three major tasks help drive performance growth?

In a financial market where homogeneous competition is increasingly prominent, creating differentiated services has become a key keyword for Ping An’s 2026.

“The deeper we go by even one inch in the depth of service, the firmer the foundation for growth becomes by even one foot.” Ma Mingzhe said in the annual report address. Since Ping An launched the “Service Commitments” in 2009, it has repeatedly raised the “Service Year” slogan, and various service upgrade initiatives have received strong recognition from customers, many of which are still in use today. In 2026, once again we will propose the “Service Year,” aiming to transform every customer need into specific and tangible service scenarios; to further upgrade the business model of “finance + services” into a trustworthy, high-quality way of life; and to provide higher value-for-money healthy and elderly-care experiences.

Guo Xiaotao said in an interview that 2026 is Ping An’s Service Year. On the one hand, it is to respond to the national “15th Five-Year Plan” (15th Five-Year Plan) and this year’s government work report, which calls for nurturing the “China Services” brand. On the other hand, it is also a need for Ping An’s own strategic development. He hopes to truly make “finance + services” into an integrated solution, providing customers with differentiated experiences. He pointed out that financial products are becoming increasingly homogeneous, but financial services themselves have not been homogenized.

With AI as the core driver for service upgrades, building a unified “quick service” entry point is one of Ping An’s major thrusts for the Service Year.

Guo Xiaotao said that this year Ping An will complete a major technology platform upgrade—the “Comprehensive Financial Services: Nine-to-One Integration” plan. The plan is intended to integrate more than 700 million internet-registered users under the group, which are currently spread across more than a dozen separate APPs, into one unified super entry point. Monthly active customers will reach 90 million, enabling comprehensive aggregation of the entry point, services, accounts, and traffic. Then, users can enjoy medical care, health, elderly care, and comprehensive financial services on any Ping An APP. More importantly, the application of AI intelligent agents at the underlying layer will make “take care of it with one sentence” a reality: users only need voice instructions to complete complex operations, greatly improving service efficiency and experience. It is believed that this will also have a stronger driving effect on product sales.

“AI is not an optional question for Ping An—it is a compulsory-answer question.” Guo Xiaotao said. Ping An has long been continuously advancing its AI deployment. Its core roles are reflected in three aspects: lowering costs and improving efficiency, optimizing customer experience, and helping drive business growth.

Guo Xiaotao explained that lowering costs and improving efficiency is not only manifested as efficiency improvement, but also as effectively reducing risk costs such as credit losses, bad debts, and insurance fraud—costs that are far higher than labor costs. The core logic behind Ping An’s use of technology is not large-scale layoffs, but optimizing the cost-and-efficiency structure as business growth occurs. AI also improves customer experience; after improvement on the cost side, it naturally makes a positive contribution to performance growth.

Building Ping An’s global urgent rescue service system is the second major thrust of the “Ping An Service Year.”

Guo Xiaotao said that this year, the “Global Urgent Rescue” service will achieve full coverage of real-world scenarios—whether indoors or outdoors, and whether within the country or globally. At the same time, it will achieve deep integration with medical care, ensuring that in the shortest possible time, the most suitable medical resources are matched for customers.

Building Ping An’s unique “Four-to” medical and elderly-care service network is the third major thrust.

Guo Xiaotao pointed out that Ping An now places greater emphasis on “insurance + services,” rather than simply insurance products. Because insurance products are becoming increasingly homogeneous. Even if innovative products are launched, they can be imitated or copied by peers within a very short time. However, services such as medical care, elderly care, and health require large-scale resource investment, long-term systematized construction, and very high levels of technological investment in order to effectively connect online and offline services. These are the financial products that can be effectively empowered by these services.

“Providing medical care, elderly care, and health services is a very important differentiated competitive advantage of Ping An’s financial products, thereby continuously building Ping An’s competitive moat.” Guo Xiaotao said.