The stock price doubles in 6 trading days! The polystyrene company Xinghui Huan Cai receives nearly 1.2 billion yuan investment from Jiushi Intelligent.

After the autonomous driving unicorn officially announced it had taken a stake, the share price of Starfire Materials (300834) surged more than 100% cumulatively over 6 trading days.

On April 3, Starfire Materials, a polystyrene producer, said in an announcement that its share price had risen by more than 100% in cumulative closing gains over 6 consecutive trading days from March 27 to April 3. The company’s performance significantly deviated from the broader market index and the industry index, with large short-term price fluctuations and a clear deviation from market trends. During that period, the share price climbed from 24.58 yuan per share to a high of 52.19 yuan per share. As of the close on April 3, it was 46.72 yuan per share, for a total market capitalization of 9.05 billion yuan.

In terms of the news flow, on March 30, Starfire Materials said in an announcement that its actual controllers, Chen Dongqiong, Chen Yansheng, Chen Chuanghuang, and their acting-in-concert party Chen Yueping, and two of their wholly owned subsidiaries under nine-tech intelligent (Zelos Group Inc.) signed equity transfer agreements. They plan to transfer to the latter some of the listed company’s equity that they indirectly hold, with a total consideration of about 1.182 billion yuan. If the transaction is completed, nine-tech intelligent will obtain 27.49% of Starfire Materials’ equity.

Since the deal was officially announced, Starfire Materials has issued three stock-trading abnormal volatility announcements. It has repeatedly warned that the company’s share price differs greatly from its fundamentals, noting that its trailing static price-to-earnings ratio is 93.1x, far higher than the industry’s average price-to-earnings ratio of 32.5x. The company also made it clear that this change in equity interests will not result in any change in the controlling shareholder or the actual controller.

As the transferee, nine-tech intelligent has committed that within 36 months after the equity transfer is completed, it will not seek the controlling right or actual control right of the listed company in any manner, and there are no plans to inject assets into the listed company.

But market sentiment has not cooled down. Even though nine-tech intelligent has clearly promised “no asset injection,” its move to invest nearly 1.2 billion yuan in Starfire Materials has still been interpreted by the market as a prelude to capital operations three years later.

nine-tech intelligent is a globally leading autonomous driving technology company, operating the world’s largest RoboVan (autonomous box truck) fleet, with operations covering multiple countries including China, Japan, South Korea, and Singapore. As of February 2026, the company has raised more than 800 million USD in financing cumulatively, and its valuation has exceeded 10 billion yuan. Investors include Dinghui Baifu, Blue Lake Capital, Baidu Venture, Ant Group, and others.

In October 2025, nine-tech intelligent won a bid for China Post’s centralized procurement project for 7,000 autonomous cargo vehicles, securing the largest global L4-level autonomous cargo vehicle order. This year, in January, the company jointly announced with Cainiao autonomous vehicles that they had reached a deep strategic integration, with Cainiao becoming a shareholder of nine-tech intelligent. nine-tech intelligent will obtain brand authorization for the “Cainiao autonomous vehicles” brand, enabling dual-brand operations.

Judging from financial data, Starfire Materials’ operating situation stands in sharp contrast to the current market hype. The company’s main business is the research, production, and sales of polystyrene (PS). It is the largest polystyrene producer in South China, with annual production capacity of 350,000 tons. Its products are used in fields such as electronic and electrical appliances, toys, plastic packaging, building materials, and medical devices. In the first three quarters of 2025, the company achieved revenue of 1.0 billion yuan, down 21.05% year over year; net profit was 39.5681 million yuan, down 44.29% year over year. In its financial report, the company explained that the decline in net profit was mainly due to slower-than-expected industry growth, narrowed product price differentials, and a decline in gross margin.

Data from the bulk commodity quotation platform Business Society shows that on April 3, the benchmark polystyrene price was 11,466.67 yuan per ton, up about 30% over the past month. However, the price increase mainly came from cost-side support, and the fundamental issue of weak downstream demand has not been resolved.

Starfire Materials’ polystyrene industry is undergoing a deep adjustment. In its announcement, the company warned that in recent years, polystyrene industry capacity has continued to expand, and the speed of capacity expansion has exceeded market demand, causing downstream markets to be unable to absorb supply in a timely manner. This may lead to fluctuations in the company’s performance. The company’s main raw material for its polystyrene products is styrene, which is a downstream bulk chemical in petroleum refining and petrochemical industries. If oil prices or the supply-demand relationship for styrene changes significantly and causes raw material prices to fluctuate sharply, the company may be unable to effectively defuse cost pressures through conventional cost-transfer mechanisms, resulting in a decline in its gross margin.

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