What to buy in the stock market in Q2 2026? Public fund leaders' insights for the first quarter

By | Zhang Ju

Edited by | Xie Changyan

What should you buy in the stock market in Q2 2026? This is what the leading mutual-fund performers in Q1 said.

Midweek this week, the Q1 2026 stock market curtains closed, and fresh results for the first-quarter rankings of mutual fund portfolios were released. With a net asset value (NAV) growth rate of 58.03%, 广发远见智选 managed by veteran Tang Xiaobin ranked first, leading the second-place fund by roughly 13 percentage points.

At the same time, the 国寿安保 fund, which previously did not have advantages in the equity space, has now pushed multiple products into the forefront of the rankings. For example, in the stock funds category, 国寿安保数字经济 and 国寿安保产业升级 placed in the top ten; in the hybrid funds category, 国寿安保核心产业 and 国寿安保策略精选 also placed in the top ten. Among them, two funds are managed by Yan Kun, and in the other two funds, the fund managers include Meng Yijia. In particular, 数字经济, which recorded a 45.38% NAV growth rate, ranked first among stock funds.**

This image may be AI-generated

Aside from the perspective of fund companies, from the perspective of fund managers, a name that had faded from investors’ view for quite some time—Gai Junlong—has returned to the public eye. Since the end of 2018, this former “Baoying Four Little Dragons” standout has managed products at Hongtu Innovation. Currently, he has five funds under his management, and the first-quarter performance of all his products is around the 20% range, with rankings among the top in their categories.

So, whether it’s a leading single product, a single company, or veteran managers renewed with energy, how do they view investments in Q2?

In a written reply to this publication, Yan Kun, a fund manager at 国寿安保, emphasized: “Geopolitical conflicts have brought significant uncertainty to global equity markets. As developments have unfolded to this point, there is a trend that Chinese assets are becoming a safe haven for global investors. Now is the time to be optimistic about China’s stock market. The current situation could become an important opportunity for the repricing of the value of Chinese assets, similar to last year’s tariff conflict. In terms of our allocation approach, I believe AI is the core main theme of the digital economy. At present, there are investment opportunities. In Q2, I will still put the main effort into researching the AI industrial chain. When laying out sub-directions in AI, I will focus on companies with large room for development, strong competitive advantages among Chinese enterprises, and valuation advantages compared with overseas targets.”

Guangfa Vison and Wisdom Select:

In Q2, may focus on storage + fiber

From the strategy selected by Western Asset that led the rankings over the first two months, to Guangfa Vison and Wisdom Select which was leading at the end of Q1, the changes in rankings behind the scenes largely reflect how market hot spots shifted from a period when resource stocks were a standout to a broad bloom of multiple tracks at quarter-end—optical communications, price increases, green electricity, lithium mines, and more. So why has Guangfa Vison and Wisdom Select been able to catch up and overtake later?

Wind information shows that Guangfa Vison and Wisdom Select was established on November 22, 2022. The company’s star first-time fund manager, Tang Xiaobin, has managed it ever since its launch. Judging by annual performance, the fund’s position among similar products improved rapidly. In 2023, it ranked 2873 out of 3287 funds. In 2024, it ranked 2948 out of 3926 funds. In 2025, it ranked 1646 out of 4409 funds. In 2026, it rose to first place among 5072 funds.

Judging from the fund’s top holdings in its 2025 quarterly report, the fund manager replaced all ten stocks in one move and successfully captured a number of bullish stocks, including 佰维存储 (Baiwei Storage), 亚翔集成 (Yaxiang Integration), 普冉股份 (Purun Shares), 德明利 (DeMingLi), among others. In particular, the newly added number one top holding 佰维存储, achieved a doubling of its stock price gains in the first quarter of 2026. Moreover, as of the end of all trading days in Q1 2026, all ten underlying targets from last year’s Q4 report saw their stock prices rise.

In the latest disclosed annual report, Tang Xiaobin said that when looking ahead to 2026 at this point in time, the A-share technology sector is undergoing a profound structural transformation. If 2023 to 2025 were a “Cambrian explosion” for AI technology—mixed with some noise and disorderly competition—then 2026 is about to enter a “Darwin moment.” A key driver of this technology cycle is AI, and AI large models are imposing disruptive requirements on storage performance. The storage industry is facing a combination of “surging demand + shrinking supply,” which has the potential to be a “super cycle.” The explosive growth in AI computing power is driving a surge in demand for high-end storage such as HBM and DDR5. The supply-demand gap continues to widen, and DRAM and NAND prices are entering an upward cycle. Domestic companies can break through quickly in the mid-tier market thanks to technological breakthroughs and substitution dividends. The industrial chain can benefit comprehensively, from chips to packaging and testing, and is expected to become one of the technology tracks with the highest certainty throughout the year. From a long-cycle perspective, there is still substantial room for development in the storage industry in the future.

“However, it’s inevitable that industrial development is cyclical. Demand and supply will fluctuate. We expect that in the future, companies’ stock prices may experience some degree of fluctuation. As a fund manager, we hope investors will fully understand the fund’s risk-return characteristics before making investment decisions. To ensure that idle money is invested, we should diversify appropriately and, from a more rational and longer-term perspective, do asset allocation well.” He further emphasized.

In its written reply to this publication, Tang Xiaobin also once again stressed the two tracks of storage and fiber optics. As for why, he frankly said that AI is the most important driver of this round of the technology cycle. The scaled implementation of AI computing power imposes disruptive requirements on the two underlying infrastructure pillars of data storage and high-speed interconnection. Storage and fiber optics/cables are precisely the two core segments with the most severe supply-demand mismatch across the entire industrial chain against the backdrop of the global AI boom. Each may also have the potential for a prosperous “super cycle.”

When specifically discussing the storage track, he elaborated on the reasons he is optimistic. New technologies such as storage pooling, GPU direct connection, and HBF make differentiated competition in the storage industry even more prominent, with growth attributes “maxed out.” From the supply-demand landscape, the demand side benefits from AI industry expansion, as AI large model training and inference, along with long texts, multimodal data, and so on, drive a surge in demand for high-end storage. On the supply side, the complete cycle from planning to mass production for core capacity can last several years, so there will unlikely be large-scale new capacity coming online in 2026. In addition, traditional industry capacity continues to shift toward AI-dedicated high-end products, further intensifying the lack of effective supply. The supply-demand gap keeps expanding, bringing expectations of a mid-to-long-term price increase wave in storage.

In addition, regarding the fiber optics track, Tang Xiaobin also analyzed that on the demand side, interconnection for AI smart computing data centers and network building for cross-park data centers are driving a surge in demand for high-end fiber optics and cables, while the share of demand for high-end categories continues to climb. In 2026, global total demand is expected to grow by 15%—20% compared with 2025. On the supply side as well, there are rigid constraints due to long-cycle capacity expansion. There is no large-scale new production capacity for optical fiber preforms (light rods) expected to be launched within 2026. Fiber optics and cables are expected to move into a favorable cycle where inventory bottoms out and prices move upward.

He acknowledged that among China’s domestic storage industry chain, the core original equipment manufacturers have not yet gone public, so the profit space that can be practically realized by the sector may be relatively limited. But if fiber optics and cables become the “next stop” for “storage,” then in the fiber optics segment, top domestic companies may be more likely to lead the distribution of profits across the industrial chain, allowing them to fully benefit from the dividends of this round’s prosperous “super cycle.”

Guoshou Anbao makes a brilliant turnaround into a major equity holding house

Fund manager Yan Kun continues to go deep into AI, with significant results

From the perspective of the fund company, if you separately count the number of active equity products in the stock and hybrid categories, Guoshou Anbao is the fund company with the most entries into the top-ten lists in both categories. It includes four products. Among them, the 国寿安保数字经济 managed by Yan Kun, with a 45.38% return rate, ranks among the very front.

According to 天天基金网, he previously worked as a research analyst at Eagle Fund. He joined Guoshou Anbao Fund in March 2018, serving successively as an industry research analyst and assistant fund manager. On December 28, 2023, he became the fund manager of 国寿安保策略精选灵活配置混合型证券投资基金 (LOF) (a flexible allocation hybrid securities investment fund). Since March 2024, he has served as the fund manager of 国寿安保数字经济股票型发起式证券投资基金.

Judging from data indicators used to measure a fund manager’s “hard strength,” as of December 31, 2025, although the total size of assets under his management for the two funds is only 618 million yuan, the best tenure return of the funds he manages has already doubled to 124.90%. And this fund is the thematic product mentioned above, 国寿安保数字经济.

Yan Kun previously said: “For the Q4 2025 of this fund, we continued to focus on the digital economy direction. Based on changes in the industry and the market, we adjusted the portfolio structure—reducing AI application holdings and increasing overseas AI computing power holdings. Looking ahead, the fund will keep pace with changes in the digital economy industry to adjust investments, explore individual stock opportunities within the sectors, and also pay close attention to risks.” According to the fund’s latest disclosed annual report for 2025 released this week, at the end of last year the portfolio held a total of only 19 stocks. Starting from the hidden top holding ranked 11th, Yan Kun’s holdings in each are less than 4%.

Re-focusing on the performance in Q1 of the top ten holdings, among them four underlying targets saw their share prices rise by more than 30% in the first quarter. In particular, the Hong Kong-listed company 长飞光纤光缆 ranked tenth among the top holdings. Its share price rose by 253.97% in the first quarter. In addition, the gains of source杰科技 (Yuanjie Technology) as the eighth top holding and 天孚通信 (Tianfu Communication) as the sixth top holding also reached the 50% range: the former was about 56.61% and the latter 48.55%.

He emphasized that Guoshou Anbao Digital Economy is a fund focusing on the digital economy direction. In Q1, it used the main logic of the digital economy to focus on laying out the AI industrial chain overall, adopting a strategy of “balancing both hardware and software, and holding both A-shares and H-shares.” On the AI hardware side, in Q1 the fund put its main effort into finding the key price-increasing links in the context of global AI computing power shortages—for example, fiber optics. At the same time, it continued the previous quarter’s configuration of leaders in the AI computing power chain that had strong performance but were undervalued. On the AI software side, in Q1 it selected individual stocks for layout based on criteria of “low valuation, large upside potential, and high certainty.”

Compared with that, the other fund he manages, 国寿安保策略精选, also looks as if it performed even better in the first quarter when compared with their top ten holdings in last Q4. In those companies, eight saw gains in the first quarter, while only 中际旭创 and 仕佳光子 saw small declines. Among those eight companies, besides 長飞光纤光缆, which has heavy weighting similar to the digital economy fund, it also includes 汇绿生态 (HuiLv Ecology), a Shenzhen Main Board listed company whose share price had risen by more than 70% during the year.

When judging the market ahead, he said: “From what I see, the market’s concerns about AI return expectations will be effectively corrected this year. Based on research and tracking data from us, since Q4 last year, the revenue of global AI model businesses has shown very clear accelerated growth. I tend to believe this trend is sustainable. Once this trend continues and is widely recognized by the market, the expected sources of funding for AI capital expenditures will shift from debt leverage to a revenue closed loop, and the market’s concerns about AI return expectations will be effectively corrected. Then it may be the main upswing phase for AI this year.”**

In addition, Wind information’s disclosed research records also show that on March 19 this year, Yan Kun and his colleagues conducted an on-site meeting to research 云南锗业.

Hongtu Innovation writes a legend of a niche fund company

Veteran Gai Junlong successfully turns the tide with five funds

From another angle at the first-quarter rankings this year, Gai Junlong, current director of the investment department of Hongtu Innovation Fund, has become a “model” in that all products he manages are advancing together. Currently, he manages five products. In the first quarter of 2026, the NAV growth rates of all five products were in the 20% range. The best performer was Hongtu Innovation Technology Stock, with 23.31%.

According to 天天基金网, Gai Junlong has held positions including industry research analyst at Great Wall Fund, research analyst at 宝盈基金, dedicated account investment manager, and fund manager. He is the current director of the company’s investment department. He manages: Hongtu Innovation Transformation Selection Flexible Allocation Hybrid Securities Investment Fund (LOF); Hongtu Innovation New Technology Stock-Initiated Securities Investment Fund; Hongtu Innovation Technology Innovation Stock Securities Investment Fund (LOF) (formerly Hongtu Innovation Technology Innovation Three-Year Closed-Operation Flexible Allocation Hybrid Securities Investment Fund); Hongtu Innovation Smart Manufacturing Hybrid Securities Investment Fund (fund manager); and Hongtu Innovation Prosperity Return Hybrid Securities Investment Fund (fund manager).

Judging from the indicators used to measure a fund manager’s “hard strength,” this veteran has accumulated nearly 11 years of tenure. Although perhaps due to platform factors his product sizes under management are only 662 million yuan, his best tenure returns for the funds under his management reached 390.62%, close to four times— and this product is the Hongtu Innovation Transformation Selection Hybrid that he has managed for the longest time at the company.

Looking at his performance in the first quarter this year, the fund’s NAV growth rate is about 19.82%. This week, the fund’s latest annual report disclosure shows that Gai Junlong had 23 holding targets in his portfolio at the end of last year, but only the holdings ranked in the top 15 had weights exceeding 3%, and only the top 7 holdings had weights exceeding 5%. From this perspective, his portfolio holdings are relatively concentrated.

Narrowing further to the performance in this year of the above top ten holdings as of December 31, 2025, in the first quarter, six of the underlying targets successfully saw their share prices rise. The best-performing three were 长光华芯 (Changguang Huaxin), 源杰科技 (Yuanjie Technology), and 天孚通信 (Tianfu Communication). All of them reached the 50% range for their performance during the year, and in particular the 科创板 company 长光华芯 saw a gain of 64.34%.

In the fund’s 2025 annual report disclosed this week, when Gai Junlong reviewed and reflected, he pointed out: “In the first half, we continued to be bullish on artificial intelligence, especially the investment opportunities in AI computing power infrastructure and applications promoted by newly released new models with major breakthroughs from large model companies such as DeepSeek. In addition, after a round of long-cycle adjustments in traditional sectors such as defense industry and new energy, we also expect there to be some favorable investment opportunities. Therefore, in the first half, the fund mainly allocated to areas such as artificial intelligence (AI computing power, AI applications), defense industry (including commercial space and low-altitude economy), and TMT, as well as some bottom-up selected companies. In the third quarter, the main allocation directions were artificial intelligence (AI computing power) and TMT. Toward the end of the quarter, we gradually increased allocations to the energy storage industrial chain. Because we continue to be optimistic about artificial intelligence, including both the development of computing power infrastructure and AI applications, we expect investment opportunities across various links of the AI industry will keep emerging—for example computing power, liquid cooling, and storage—so in the fourth quarter, the main allocation directions will also be artificial intelligence (AI computing power) and TMT.”**

When assessing the market this year, Gai Junlong also emphasized: “From a more optimistic perspective, in 2026 there are various possible investment opportunities: currently more favorable sectors such as artificial intelligence, energy storage (the lithium battery industrial chain), non-ferrous metals, and chemicals. There may also be investment opportunities in traditional industries that could present opportunities from a cycle perspective, such as liquor, defense industry, and photovoltaics. There are also emerging industries with a steady stream of developments—for example commercial space, nuclear fusion, domestic computing power chains, AI applications, robotics, brain-computer interface, and more. Currently, this product favors technology growth directions with stronger certainty. Going forward, it will actively track and research other industries, and will dynamically optimize investment strategies based on market conditions.”

(This article was published in the Securities Market Weekly on April 4. The funds mentioned in the article are only used as examples for analysis and do not constitute a recommendation for buying or selling.)