Revenue and profit both hit new highs. What enables China Merchants Securities to maintain a steady growth trajectory?

Produced|China Visit Network

Reviewed|Li Xiaoyan

As China’s A-share market gradually works its way out of its cyclical trough in 2025, leading securities firms have all entered a period of earnings recovery. China Merchants Securities demonstrates strong rebound momentum and a solid development foundation with an annual report showing double-digit growth in both revenue and profit. Full-year operating revenue reached RMB 24.97B, up 19.53% year over year; net profit attributable to shareholders reached RMB 12.35B, up 18.91% year over year—both reaching historical highs. Weighted ROE rose to 9.94%, and core profitability indicators improved across the board. This performance is not only a tailwind growth story as the market warms up, but also reflects the company’s long-term accumulation in wealth management, institutional services, tech enablement, and risk control. It signals that China Merchants Securities is moving from cyclical recovery into a steady new phase of high-quality development.

As one of China Merchants Securities’s core growth engines, wealth management and institutional business achieved a leap in development in 2025. Full-year revenue reached RMB 13.83B, up 35.10% year over year, accounting for more than 55% of total revenue—becoming the company’s most solid base. Behind this result lies years of deep cultivation of retail and institutional customer segments, as well as sustained momentum from driving digital transformation.

Customer and asset scale have expanded in tandem, underscoring a strong customer base. By year-end, the number of normal trading customers exceeded 20.97 million, up 8.67% year over year; custodial customer assets reached RMB 5.29 trillion, up 23.89% year over year. Wealth management AUM also surged 29% year over year, setting a new historical high. Onshore stock fund trading volume reached RMB 4.535 trillion, up nearly 70% year over year, broadly keeping pace with industry activity levels, showing strong trading stickiness. The advantages in the institutional business are even more prominent: the coverage rate of trading for “billion-yuan” private placement clients exceeded 90%, and the market share of the number of private fund custody products was over 21%. The number of public fund custody products grew by nearly 25% year over year, and the company’s institutional service capabilities have remained firmly among the top tier in the industry.

More valuable still, the company has moved from traditional brokerage to a deep transformation into comprehensive wealth management, building a dual-wheel service model of “AI + human” assistance. By year-end, the wealth advisor team size reached 1,468 people. Relying on the intelligent investment advisory tool “Zhao Xiao’” and a digital service system, it provides full-cycle services covering asset allocation, investment advisory, and wealth planning for a large number of retail customers and high-net-worth groups. This shift from a “transaction channel” to a “wealth steward” effectively reduces reliance on a single commission income stream, enabling the wealth management business to gradually develop anti-cyclical attributes and become a stabilizer for navigating market fluctuations.

While core main businesses are growing strongly, China Merchants Securities’s four business segments show a balanced and positive trend: the investment banking business is accelerating its recovery, proprietary trading is defending steadily, and asset management is growing steadily—overall, its comprehensive financial service capability continues to strengthen.

In 2025, the investment banking business delivered both improvement in quantity and quality, with full-year revenue of RMB 52.9k, up 20.27%. Equity and bond underwriting achieved breakthroughs on both fronts: it completed underwriting for 10 A-share IPOs, lifting its industry ranking to 4th, the best performance in nearly a decade; bond lead-underwriting scale reached RMB 517.5 billion, ranking 10th in the industry. Even more outstanding is its ability to serve the real economy. The company closely aligns with the “five major articles” of finance, focusing precisely on science and technology finance, green finance, and inclusive finance. Full-year underwriting amounts were RMB 453.5k in science and technology finance, RMB 1.03B in green finance, and RMB 65.13B in inclusive finance, empowering the development of new-quality productive forces through professionalized services. At the same time, investment bank practice quality maintained an “A” rating, and there were 13 IPO reserve projects, providing ample momentum for future growth.

Proprietary and asset management businesses uphold a steady foundation, providing reliable support for performance. Full-year revenue from investment and trading was RMB 6.94 billion, up 9.56%. Even on the high base of 2024, the company still achieved steady growth. The company adopted a prudent strategy of “fixed-income as the foundation with equity strengthening.” In trading financial assets, the proportion of bonds is about 60%, effectively controlling risk and locking in returns amid market volatility, demonstrating strong large-class asset allocation and risk management capabilities. Revenue from investment management was RMB 954 million, up 3.29%. Backed by two public-fund platforms, Boshi Fund and China Merchants Fund, assets under management expanded steadily, and the product system continued to become more diverse.

As a core business in margin financing and securities lending, both scale and quality improved in parallel. By year-end, the margin financing and securities lending balance was about RMB 133.4 billion, up 40% from the beginning of the year. Market share rose to 5.2%, and the scale of funds lent via financing reached RMB 22.61B. While expanding in scale, the company strengthened credit risk control, optimized customer structure and improved target selection. Business quality remained excellent, making it an important source of stable interest income while further enhancing customer stickiness.

Behind the growth in performance is China Merchants Securities’s continuous investment in financial technology and risk control—injecting strong momentum into high-quality development and building a solid safety line.

Financial technology transformation is leading in the industry. In 2025, it achieved three major core breakthroughs: it built the first cloud-native architecture core trading system in the securities industry, with substantially improved trading processing capability and stability; it fully advanced the construction of an “AI securities company,” with the large-model application “Zhao Zheng Tianqi” rolled out, and intelligent marketing, intelligent risk control, and intelligent operations scenarios were comprehensively deployed; digital capabilities were deeply integrated into every business line. APP monthly active users grew 13.44% year over year, and average daily usage time per user ranked first in the industry, with clear results from technology enablement. Full-year information technology investment reached RMB 37.78B, up more than 20%. By using technology to drive cost reduction and efficiency gains, and service upgrades, it built a differentiated competitive advantage.

The risk control system continued to improve, and operating quality improved steadily. The company has always adhered to a prudent operating philosophy, with the asset-liability ratio controlled at around 80%, staying within a reasonable range for the industry. Facing market volatility, it strengthened comprehensive risk management, optimized its asset structure, and ensured effective control of credit risk, market risk, and liquidity risk, keeping asset impairment losses at a low level. Even though operating cash flows faced short-term pressure due to business seasonality and fluctuations in financial assets, it did not change the company’s overall sound liquidity position and asset quality—further highlighting the authenticity and sustainability of profit growth.

Advance beyond the cycle to achieve a higher-quality path that is steadier and farther

From an industry perspective, China Merchants Securities’s growth in 2025 is both a result of acting in step with a warming market and a breakthrough in its own capabilities driven by deep strategic focus. Against the backdrop that listed securities firms’ net profits grew 44.61% year over year on average across 26 companies, China Merchants Securities’s net profit growth of 18.91% is not the fastest. However, its advantage lies in solid fundamentals, optimized structure, and reliable quality. Compared with leading peers, while China Merchants Securities still has room to improve in terms of investment banking scale and the flexibility of proprietary trading, its leading edge in wealth management, deep institutional business moat, early-mover advantage in tech enablement, and a risk control system that is steady and reliable collectively build a distinct core competitiveness.

China Merchants Securities is currently in a crucial stage of upgrading through both cyclical repair and structural optimization. Its wealth management and institutional business base is becoming more solid; coordination among businesses such as investment banking, asset management, and proprietary trading is strengthening; financial technology and risk control act as a dual-wheel protection; combined with resource enablement from China Merchants Group and the advantages of a full-license business model, the company has developed a solid foundation for going through cycles and growing steadily. In the short term, challenges objectively exist—such as the downward trend in commission rates caused by market volatility and minor fluctuations in market share. But in the long term, these are precisely important opportunities for the company to optimize its structure and enhance competitiveness.

For a leading securities firm, true “stability” has never meant only hitting new profit highs within a single cycle. Instead, it is a comprehensive reflection of continuously optimized business structure, steady improvement in core market share, continuously strengthening ability to withstand risks, and ongoing advancement in serving the real economy. China Merchants Securities’s 2025 answer sheet clearly shows a distinct thread of “repair for the better and enhance quality and efficiency.” This financial supertanker has sailed out of shallow cyclical waters. With a solid business base, strong transformation momentum, and a prudent operating philosophy, it is steadily moving into the deep waters of high-quality development. Looking ahead, as wealth management continues to deepen, investment banking capabilities continue to improve, tech enablement continues to deepen, and internationalization arrangements continue to advance, China Merchants Securities is expected to further consolidate its top-tier position and chart a steadier, farther, and more sustainable development path amid cyclical fluctuations.