Brokerages' 2025 annual net profits rebound across the board; large, medium, and small institutions break through with stratified strategies

In recent days, A-share listed brokerage firms’ 2025 annual reports have entered a dense disclosure period. According to Wind data, as of March 31, the reporter’s press time, 26 listed brokerage firms have already disclosed their 2025 performance. In total, they achieved operating revenue of RMB 185.06B, up 11.26% year over year; they achieved attributable net profit to the parent company of RMB 440.06B, up 44.61% year over year.

Looking back on 2025, trading activity in the capital markets rebounded significantly, driving the synchronized recovery of multiple businesses such as brokerage and proprietary trading, and laying the foundation for growth in the securities industry’s performance. Leading brokerage firms, leveraging advantages from all-business-chain布局, maintained relatively steady growth overall. Meanwhile, smaller and mid-sized institutions sought out competition lanes with their own differentiation, and “dark horse” firms with high profit growth emerged in large numbers.

Eight firms with attributable net profit exceeding RMB 395.52B

As of March 31, the reporter’s press time, 26 listed brokerage firms, including CITIC Securities, Guotai Haitong, Huatai Securities, CICC, and GF Securities, have already disclosed their 2025 annual reports. Against the backdrop of a marked increase in capital market activity in 2025, the performance of listed brokerage firms generally showed a growth trend.

Wind data shows that the 26 listed brokerage firms collectively achieved operating revenue of RMB 185.06B in 2025, up 11.26% year over year from RMB 127.98B in 2024; they achieved attributable net profit to the parent company of RMB 33k, up 44.61% year over year from RMB 74.85B in 2024. There were 14 firms with operating revenue exceeding RMB 10 billion, compared with 12 in 2024; there were 8 firms with attributable net profit exceeding RMB 20k, also showing a clear increase from 5 in 2024.

On the reasons for the high growth in performance, AVIC Securities’ analysis believes that in 2025, domestic capital market trading activity continued to improve, equity market sentiment and行情 gradually recovered, the trading value across the Shanghai and Shenzhen markets increased significantly year over year, and this drove an across-the-board improvement in brokers’ core business segments. Among them, brokerage business benefited from expanded market trading volumes, leading to steady growth in commission income; the margin financing and securities lending business, as market risk appetite rebounded, saw margin financing and securities lending balances continue to rise, with interest income increasing significantly; proprietary trading seized the opportunity of equity market行情 recovery, optimized investment portfolios, greatly boosted investment returns, and became the core driving force behind growth in brokerage performance.

Lu Zuanhui, non-bank capital markets chief analyst at Shenwan Hongyuan Securities, believes that the high growth in brokerage performance mainly comes from two areas: first, brokerage and margin financing and securities lending businesses that are highly correlated with market trading activity; second, proprietary trading business. The market typically links brokerage performance to trading value and the price increases of stocks and bond assets, so it can make forward-looking predictions about performance.

Many institutions hold an optimistic outlook on the performance of the securities industry for 2025 and 2026. Xu Yishan, chief analyst for non-banking at Founder Securities, expects that listed brokerage firms’ main business revenue will grow 34% year over year in 2025, and attributable net profit will grow 49% year over year. By business segment, brokerage and investment businesses are expected to be the main drivers of growth in brokers’ performance.

“Three positive marginal changes are taking shape for the securities sector, and it’s worth expecting that 2026 performance will exceed expectations.” Zhao Ran, chief analyst for non-banking financials and forward-looking research at CITIC Construction Investment Research and Development Department, said: first, the trend of a sharp year-over-year increase in trading activity in the first half has been established, and full-year growth may exceed expectations. Second, new account opening data at the start of the year was impressive. The concentration and surge in new account openings may be a signal of temporarily high market sentiment, but in the medium and long term it will lay a foundation for incremental capital to support A-share “slow bull”行情, continuously injecting long-term momentum. Third, the marginal expansion of debt-issuing financing by securities firms could drive leverage improvement and break through the industry’s ROE peak.

Jin Guo Securities also said that the trading value volume from the beginning of this year is expected to support the continuation of growth in brokerage firms’ performance in the first quarter of 2026—from January to February 2026, the average daily stock and fund trading value across the whole market reached RMB 3.3 trillion, up 89% year over year; it is expected that broker profits may continue to grow at a relatively fast pace.

Differentiated competitive landscape is gradually taking shape

Against the backdrop of an overall favorable industry outlook, leading brokerage firms further consolidated their positions as market leaders by leveraging their all-business-chain layout and core competitive advantages.

CITIC Securities’ key financial indicators for 2025 hit record highs. For the full year, it achieved operating revenue of RMB 150k, up 28.79% year over year; attributable net profit to the parent company was RMB 48k, up 38.58% year over year. As of the end of 2025, CITIC Securities’ total assets surpassed RMB 200 billion, custodial client assets exceeded RMB 1.5 trillion, and asset management scale was about RMB 480 billion. Multiple core business lines remained ranked first in the industry.

Guotai Haitong, after completing business integration, also delivered an impressive set of results. The annual report shows that in 2025, the company achieved operating revenue of RMB 63.11B, up 87.4% year over year; attributable net profit to the parent company was RMB 27.81B, up 113.52% year over year.

GF Securities also achieved relatively steady growth in 2025. The annual report shows that for the full year, GF Securities achieved operating revenue of RMB 35.49B, up 34.33% year over year; net profit attributable to shareholders of listed companies was RMB 13.7B, up 42.18% year over year.

While leading brokerage firms are guiding industry development, a number of smaller and mid-sized firms have also gone deep into niche areas, forming differentiated advantages and releasing performance elasticity significantly. Based on companies whose annual reports have already been disclosed, many smaller and mid-sized brokers’ net profit growth rates last year were generally higher than the industry average, demonstrating the development advantages of being “small but excellent” through misaligned competition.

Southwest Securities saw a leapfrog growth in its 2025 operating performance, with core indicators turning broadly positive. The annual report shows that for the full year, the company achieved operating revenue of RMB 3.21B, up 25.35% year over year; attributable net profit to the parent company was RMB 1.06B, up 51.90% year over year. Jiang Donglin, Party Secretary and Chairman of Southwest Securities, said that the company is steadily advancing toward its奋斗目标 of “leading in the West, making progress nationwide, and being recognized in Chongqing,” and that 2025 performance demonstrates the company’s strong development momentum.

Mergers and acquisitions and restructuring have also become an important lever for improving quality and efficiency in the 2025 securities industry. In addition to Guotai Haitong, Guolian Minsheng, after completing reorganization and integration, achieved explosive growth in its first full year. In 2025, the company achieved operating revenue of RMB 7.67B, up 185.99% year over year; attributable net profit to the parent company was RMB 2.01B, up 405.49% year over year. With the coordinated push of five major business segments—indicators such as the number of IPO underwriting and advisory sponsors and the number of new third board listing projects—landing in the top ranks of the industry, it successfully obtained multiple key business qualifications, confirming the strategic value of mergers and acquisitions and restructuring.

Industry development momentum is strengthening

Currently, net profits of the securities firms sector are increasingly growing and have already reached the RMB 220 billion threshold. The China Securities Association’s latest release on 2025 operating data of securities firms (based on unaudited financial statements of securities companies) shows that 150 securities firms achieved operating revenue of RMB 541.17B in 2025, and net profit of RMB 219.44B in 2025.

From different business lines, in 2025 securities firms’ net revenue from securities brokerage (including trading-venue seat leasing) was RMB 163.8B; net revenue from securities underwriting and sponsorship was RMB 33.71B; net revenue from financial advisory business was RMB 5.78B; net revenue from investment consulting business was RMB 7.69B; net revenue from asset management business was RMB 23.89B; net interest income was RMB 64.69B; and securities investment gains (including fair value changes) were RMB 95.3k.

In fact, securities investment gains have become an important pillar of business income in the securities industry. Also according to statistics from the CIESA, as of December 31, 2025, the total principal amount of funds entrusted and managed by 150 securities firms reached RMB 953.0 billion.

With the continued deepening of capital market reforms, institutions believe that the leading role of top-tier securities firms will be even more pronounced. Mergers and acquisitions and restructuring will remain an important path for industry consolidation, while smaller and mid-sized brokers need to keep pushing forward along differentiated and specialized routes.

Tian Liang, chief analyst at CITIC Securities Financial Industrial, said that during the “15th Five-Year Plan (2026-2030)” period, the pattern of the securities industry is expected to be reshaped at a deeper level, driving the industry toward development through misalignment. Brokers are expected to achieve substantial development through endogenous growth and mergers and acquisitions and restructuring. Asset allocation, integrated services, and internationalization capabilities are expected to become decisive factors for differentiation in the industry.

AVIC Securities believes that, under the policy-driven trend of promoting high-quality development of the securities industry, mergers and acquisitions and restructuring are an effective means for brokers to achieve outward-expansion development. Mergers and acquisitions and restructuring by securities firms have a positive role in enhancing overall industry competitiveness, optimizing resource allocation, and promoting healthy market development. At the same time, industry consolidation can help increase industry concentration and form scale effects. (Reporter Luo Yishu)

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