Huashang Fund's Wang Xiaogang: Committing to active management to create medium- and long-term value for investors

Source: China Securities Journal

Reporter: Wang Yulu

In December 2005, amid the wave of China’s public mutual fund development, Huashang Fund was born and set sail in China’s capital market. Twenty years is both a measure of time and a test of performance. When the 22nd Golden Bull Award for Fund Industry was awarded to Huashang Fund, this heavy honor of “Active Equity Investment Golden Bull Fund Company” not only crowned past achievements but also deeply examined the company’s original intention and resilience.

Recently, Wang Xiaogang, General Manager of Huashang Fund, told China Securities Journal that during these years of turbulent capital markets, Huashang Fund has always regarded active management as its lifeline. Through top-down strategic discipline, systematic platform and talent development, and continuous iteration of investment research methodologies, it has built a foundation supporting long-term steady performance.

Huashang Fund General Manager Wang Xiaogang

Building a Foundation for Development with Active Management

Over the past twenty years, Huashang Fund has embedded the “steadfast active management” into its DNA—standing on professionalism, not chasing short-term trends, but relying on deep accumulation to identify the most vital companies amid economic development and industrial changes. This perseverance is especially precious amid market noise and temptations.

In Wang Xiaogang’s view, this core gene is built on several solid pillars. First is the company’s philosophy of “perseverance and commitment to active management,” which provides long-term stability for the research team. Despite drastic changes in the capital markets over the years, Huashang Fund’s management has consistently upheld the idea that “active management is Huashang Fund’s lifeline,” integrating it into every aspect of corporate strategy, with ongoing investment in research capabilities. Under the philosophy of “deep research-driven investing,” Huashang Fund has always adhered to building safety margins through thorough fundamental analysis and growing together with excellent listed companies. This top-down strategic discipline allows the research team to stay calm at market peaks, resist fleeting trends, and focus on in-depth fundamental research.

Second is a well-structured, orderly talent development system that continuously supplies active management capabilities, ensuring the transfer of research expertise. By the end of 2025, Huashang Fund had built a research team of 71 members, including 31 fund managers, 5 investment managers, and 35 researchers. The team’s average working experience is 8.84 years, with an average of 7.92 years in securities industry; among them, 22 fund managers and investment managers have over 10 years of experience. Outstanding research talents are constantly accumulating and growing, continuously contributing to active equity investments. Meanwhile, the company actively recruits external top talent, with senior internal fund managers mentoring younger members, and external fresh blood enriching the research pool.

In addition to “source of vitality,” an effective mechanism platform is essential. Huashang Fund continuously enhances core research capabilities and accelerates the development of an “integrated, multi-strategy platform.” The company has built its own “Huashang Jinhailuo” research platform to support integrated research, digitizing scattered historical roadshow records, research notes, portfolio recommendations, and net value curves, turning each fund manager’s alpha into a reusable beta for Huashang.

Relying on Huashang’s research system, a clear division of labor and efficient collaboration mechanisms have gradually formed. Fund managers are assigned detailed roles based on their experience and expertise, creating a multi-layered, comprehensive research network. Multiple project teams are established for cross-group research, breaking traditional departmental barriers and promoting deep collaboration. Researchers focus on fundamental analysis, serving as “industry experts” in their fields, providing actionable investment advice and ensuring their fundamental research stays ahead of the market; fund managers focus more on assessing how the market will respond to fundamental changes and making final investment decisions.

Beyond the “hard platform,” Huashang Fund also values “soft culture”—active communication and sharing. The firm emphasizes communication mechanisms among research personnel by building internal research platforms, integrating internal and external resources, and enabling real-time information sharing to shorten the “research-investment” chain. Based on clear division of responsibilities, Huashang Fund values team communication and idea exchange. Regular research meetings provide high-frequency interaction platforms for fund managers and researchers, helping to jointly explore investment strategies, deepen understanding, and continuously optimize and iterate strategies. Under this mechanism, young fund managers with industry research backgrounds can systematically develop their methodologies through research practice, expand their skill sets by participating in discussions on other industries, and ultimately develop mature, market-wide investment approaches, growing into experienced, comprehensive fund managers.

Building a Leading Edge Through Continuous Iteration

Investment is a philosophy of time—balancing short-term volatility with long-term value is the ultimate challenge for every investment team’s wisdom and courage. In recent years, Huashang Fund’s active equity products have maintained strong risk resistance and excess returns. The secret can be summarized in four characters: “守正出奇” (upholding the fundamentals while innovating).

“守正” (upholding the fundamentals) is the foundation and starting point. Wang Xiaogang explains that it means always prioritizing the interests of holders, relying on a strong research platform, adhering to the bottom line of value, and using “margin of safety” as a guiding principle for every investment decision. Whether investing in growth or value stocks, the premise must be that prices are below intrinsic value with reasonable valuation protections. He firmly believes that solid fundamental research is the basis for sustainable excess returns. This almost stubborn “value-oriented” approach helps the team stay calm amid market euphoria and be brave during panic.

However, “守正” does not mean being conservative or unchanging. “出奇” (innovating) involves actively and keenly capturing industry changes based on the value foundation, seeking explosive opportunities in high-growth sectors, and managing risk through dynamic positioning and sector allocation. In recent years, amid domestic and international upheavals and increased market volatility, Huashang Fund recognizes that within the vast market uncertainties, there are certain emerging industries with explosive potential. Through in-depth research, they aim to grasp these certain industry trends and opportunities, balancing short-term fluctuations with long-term value.

Markets are always changing; the only constant is change itself. In recent years, facing volatile markets and technological revolutions, Huashang Fund’s methodology has evolved continuously. Investment styles have diversified from traditional value growth to include growth, balanced, value, and cyclical strategies, making active equity styles more varied.

Furthermore, to maintain a competitive edge in unpredictable markets, the research system must possess vitality for self-evolution and self-iteration. Over recent years, Huashang Fund’s active investment methodology, centered on “deep research-driven investing,” has undergone quiet refinement and sophistication.

The most notable evolution is the shift from “static value” to “dynamic value.” Wang Xiaogang states: “We refine value into deep value, growth value, and strategic value. Deep value focuses more on static valuation or historical performance; growth value emphasizes industry growth and value changes. Our methodology emphasizes ‘dynamic’ and ‘marginal’ aspects—shifting from seeking absolute good companies to identifying companies with improving fundamentals that are undervalued by the market.”

Second is the transformation from “individual stock picking” to “industry exploration.” Historically, Huashang Fund was known for bottom-up stock selection, but in the new market environment, they have strengthened top-down macro perspectives and mid-level industry comparisons, building a comprehensive coverage and tracking system across all sectors. The unified research platform allows all “value” discussions and comparisons within a single dimension, systematically tracking and comparing industries to identify the best sectors. Based on this, different style fund managers select the best opportunities according to their investment frameworks.

A deeper transformation is the elevation from “company research” to “industry research.” Huashang Fund requires its research team not just to do superficial industry coverage but to become “walking encyclopedias” and true industry experts in their fields. “We require deep exploration of business models, management, and moats, conducting the most in-depth, forward-looking systematic research in our chosen areas to fully grasp alpha opportunities within niche sectors and produce actionable investment advice,” he said.

Using industry perspectives to grasp the main themes of the era

Any major industry trend originates from a theme and ends in value. Genuine industry investment must align with the era’s largest background, where marginal changes often harbor the greatest investment opportunities.

Looking back over China’s capital market history of over thirty years, many systemic investment opportunities have emerged from shifts in the times: the 2005 industrialization and urbanization boom, the 2015 mobile internet wave following smartphone release, the 2016-2017 supply-side reforms and cyclical stock surge, the 2019-2021 consumption upgrade boom, the 2020-2022 new energy wave driven by carbon neutrality, and the 2022-end GPT-3.5 release sparking the AI wave. From Huashang Fund’s recent equity investment trajectory, it’s clear that keen perception of economic and industrial changes has enabled systematic capture of opportunities in 5G, new energy, AI, humanoid robots, and more.

Looking ahead to 2026, Huashang Fund’s research team believes that the “policy support + industry-driven” dual framework remains solid. The domestic economy is steadily advancing toward high-quality development, policies continue to support capital markets, social confidence is recovering, and external pressures are transforming into momentum for deepening reforms—key factors for healthy, high-quality market growth.

AI industry remains a core focus. As AI models improve domestically and internationally, cost reduction and efficiency gains are already being implemented across many sectors and scenarios, reshaping the world with unprecedented depth and breadth. The AI industry’s prosperity continues to strengthen and expand into storage, edge AI, energy storage, and other growth areas. Huashang Fund’s research team believes AI will remain a key focus in the near future, with ongoing development and progress in both domestic and international AI industries, continuously exploring niche growth directions under the broader AI beta trend.

Beyond the AI supply chain, Huashang Fund’s vision also covers multiple strategic emerging industries. They will continue to monitor and compare sector trends, seeking the best opportunities. Specifically, in robotics, Huashang Fund sees the current stage as 0-1 investment, focusing on whether T-robotics can achieve large-scale production and monitoring suitable pricing; in innovative medicine, they focus on policy support and market potential, expecting significant breakthroughs in market size and profitability; solid-state batteries are on the verge of commercialization, with breakthroughs promising ongoing investment opportunities; in new consumer sectors, post-macroeconomic stabilization, these sectors are expected to offer significant elasticity and are key areas of focus.

Risk reminder: Huashang Fund received the “Active Equity Investment Golden Bull Fund Company Award” issued by China Securities Journal in December 2025. The fund manager commits to honest, diligent, and prudent management of fund assets but does not guarantee profits or minimum returns. Past performance and net value do not predict future results, and performance of other funds managed by the fund manager does not guarantee the fund’s performance. Investors should carefully read the fund contract, prospectus, and key information documents before investing. For detailed investment strategies, see the legal documents. The above content is not investment advice; markets carry risks, and investment should be cautious. Investors are advised to choose products aligned with their risk tolerance and investment goals.

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Editor: Jiang Yuhan

【Source: China Securities Journal】