Five annual reports, the same signal

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Benefiting from more active market trading, the financial information services industry has seen a banner year for performance. As five companies—including THS (Eastmoney), Oriental Wealth, Zhinanzhen, Great Wisdom, and Nine Chapters Zhitou—have released their annual reports in succession, a picture of “improving industry conditions but increasing differentiation” has emerged: some companies are raking in profits hand over fist, while others are still searching for new paths. And in the annual reports of these five companies, AI is a keyword that cannot be avoided—it is no longer just decorative icing on the cake, but a variable reshaping industry dynamics.

Revenue rises across the board, but profit divergence is clear

A market rebound in trading activity has become the shared catalyst for the industry. In 2025, all five companies achieved positive revenue growth on average, but their net profit performance and the quality of their growth vary significantly.

With a “securities + fund” dual-engine model, Oriental Wealth remains firmly at the top of the industry. In 2025, the company recorded operating revenue of 16.068 billion yuan, up 38.46%; attributable net profit of 12.085 billion yuan, up 25.75%. In terms of revenue mix, the securities business contributed 78.02% of revenue, and its subsidiary, Oriental Wealth Securities, generated net profit of 8.878 billion yuan; 天天基金 (Tian Tian Fund) achieved net profit of 180 million yuan.

THS (i.e., Tonghuashun) achieved operating revenue of 6.029 billion yuan in 2025, up 44%; attributable net profit of 3.205 billion yuan, up 75.79%. Among them, advertising and internet business promotion services are the core engine behind its revenue growth. Revenue from this segment was 3.462 billion yuan, up 70.98%, with its share of revenue rising from 48.36% in 2024 to 57.43%.

Nine Chapters Zhitou Holding generated total income of approximately 3.43 billion yuan in 2025, up 48.7%; profit attributable to shareholders of approximately 922 million yuan, with a year-on-year growth rate of 238.5%. The company’s AI terminal product, “Nine Chapters Zhitou AI Stock Machine,” contributed revenue of 240 million yuan, becoming a new growth driver.

Zhinanzhen and Great Wisdom are in different phases of catching up and repair, respectively. Zhinanzhen achieved revenue of 2.146 billion yuan in 2025, up 40.39%; attributable net profit of 228 million yuan, with a year-on-year increase of 118.74%. Among them, securities services generated revenue of 607 million yuan, up 91.19%; the net fee income from brokerage business at 麦高证券 (Maigao Securities) was 487 million yuan, up 110.34%. Great Wisdom achieved operating revenue of 827 million yuan in 2025, up 7.23%; attributable net profit was a loss of 44.0257 million yuan, but narrowed sharply compared with the loss of 201 million yuan in the same period of the previous year.

Different “business playbooks” behind the traffic

As a provider of financial information services, their app is one of the most direct arenas for comparison. According to QuestMobile? (易观千帆) data, the average monthly active user (MAU) rankings of the five companies’ apps in May 2025 are as follows: THS monthly active users were 35.4991 million, ranking first in the industry; Oriental Wealth followed with 17.4277 million; Great Wisdom had 12.0955 million, ranking third in the industry; Zhinanzhen had 1.8446 million stock app MAUs; and Nine Chapters Zhitou Holding had 0.511 million MAUs.

This ranking does not correspond to the revenue scale of the five companies, because behind the MAU numbers are four quite different “business playbooks.”

Industry observers generally believe Oriental Wealth is one of the few companies that successfully completed a “traffic + license” closed loop. After years of development, the company has built an internet wealth management ecosystem centered on “Oriental Wealth Network,” gathering massive user resources with strong user stickiness. As it obtained licenses such as securities and fund sales, its main business shifted from “selling software” to genuine financial services. Securities trading commissions, margin trading and securities lending interest, and fund distribution commissions form the core of its revenue.

THS, on the other hand, has taken a monetization path of “technology + traffic.” The company focuses on routing traffic to securities firms and selling software to the two ends of the BC ecosystem. The former forms its core revenue source—“advertising and internet business promotion services”—while the latter is its second-largest revenue source—“value-added telecommunications services.” This asset-light, high-gross-margin model enables it to remain strong in profitability even though it does not hold heavy-capital licenses.

As a leader in early market data software, Great Wisdom still has brand awareness and a user base, but because it lacks a clear monetization path, the value of its traffic has already weakened. Sun Ting, Chief of Non-Bank Financial Institutions at Soochow Securities, said in a research report that after Great Wisdom merges with Xiangcai Securities, whether it can effectively convert these traffic resources into sustainable revenue will be a key point to watch in its subsequent development.

Zhinanzhen and Nine Chapters Zhitou Holding have taken differentiated paths. Zhinanzhen uses financial information services as its core fundamental business to attract customers. Its securities business, as a key link in monetizing traffic, has gradually formed a second revenue curve. The company also plans to form a third revenue curve and a wealth management closed loop in the future by acquiring 90.02% of the equity of Pioneer Fund. Nine Chapters Zhitou Holding, meanwhile, sticks to a “research/investment + technology” dual-engine approach, covering different tiers of customer needs through a three-dimensional product system, and leveraging Hong Kong Fangde Securities and others to accelerate overseas business expansion.

AI race to break through and solve the traffic dilemma

No matter how business models differentiate, AI has become a high-frequency term in everyone’s 2025 annual reports. Even though the direction of investment and strategic positioning differ, the emphasis on AI is clear.

THS is the representative of heavily betting on AI. In 2025, the company’s R&D expenses were 1.145 billion yuan, accounting for 18.99% of revenue. Although both figures fell compared with the previous year, they are still higher than peers. Judging from its annual report, THS’s R&D spending is concentrated in large models, intelligent research and investment, and investment advisory domains. Its personal investment assistant, “Wen Cai,” has already covered core scenarios such as stock selection, stock diagnostics, strategy validation, and risk management. In the future, it will also focus on pushing the iFinD platform to fully evolve into an “asset management AI assistant.”

Oriental Wealth’s AI strategy shows characteristics of an “application-oriented, service-ecosystem” approach. In 2025, its R&D expenses were 1.067 billion yuan, accounting for 6.64% of revenue. Its R&D spending mainly focuses on AI empowerment of the existing financial ecosystem—such as Miaoxiang Financial large models and investment research assistants—with the goal of strengthening the moats of existing businesses including trading, news/information, and fund sales, and improving user service efficiency. The recently released “Oriental Wealth Skills” also aims to move AI capabilities from information services toward intelligent research and investment.

Other companies are in the stage of differentiated experimentation. Nine Chapters Zhitou Holding has already achieved commercialization and deployment on the C-end AI products. Zhinanzhen’s AI buildout is still at an early stage: it started constructing an intelligent customer service system in February 2025, and related projects are still progressing. Great Wisdom, last year, applied its AI capabilities comprehensively across various products, enabling intelligent upgrades of services such as basic content, strategy platforms, and interactive Q&A.

Although the focus and pace of AI strategies differ, the industry faces a common challenge: traffic acquisition costs keep rising. In 2025, except for Great Wisdom, the other four companies saw large increases in sales expenses. The year-on-year growth rates of sales expenses for Zhinanzhen, Nine Chapters Zhitou Holding, THS, and Oriental Wealth were 38.09%, 33.4%, 28.24%, and 19.61%, respectively.

Yang Ling, an expert in securities industry consulting at QuestMobile? (易观千帆), analyzed for a reporter that in the past, competition among financial information service providers mainly revolved around channels—who could reach more users. Now, against the backdrop of soaring customer acquisition costs, AI is seen as a key variable to break the traffic dilemma and enhance user lifetime value. Whoever can serve users more precisely through AI and convert traffic more efficiently will be in an advantageous position in the next phase of competition.

Author: Liu Yuxi, Xu Wei

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