Heading Towards Buyers | Ant Investment Advisory: Buyer Investment Advisory Guides Capital from Short-Term Trading to Long-Term Allocation

China Economic Journal Reporter Luo Ji reports from Beijing, Shanghai, and Guangzhou

“Against the backdrop of high-quality development in the current capital markets, buy-side investment advisors are actively guiding funds to shift from short-term trading to long-term allocation. Take ‘Help You Invest’ as an example; its investment advisory users have increased their holding periods by 55% compared to non-advisory users,” said a person in charge related to Ant Investment Advisory in an exclusive interview with China Business Journal.

As an important direction for wealth management transformation, the core capabilities of buy-side investment advisors—such as professional multi-asset allocation and full-process client support services—are playing an irreplaceable supporting role in guiding the “long-term money, long-term investment” ecosystem.

To steadily and practically advance on the path of buy-side investment advisory, the aforementioned person believes that buy-side advisory institutions must adhere to a true “buy-side stance,” which means ensuring neutrality in product selection; long-term effectiveness in strategy construction; and deep management of client expectations.

Technology + Professional Dual Drive to Promote the Implementation of Long-term Investment Concepts

The core demand of long-term funds is to match investors’ long-term goals and pursue steady returns across cycles, which fundamentally differs from the trading needs of short-term funds.

As an important cornerstone of stable capital market development, how to guide funds from short-term trading to long-term allocation is a key issue for wealth management institutions.

According to the person in charge from Ant Investment Advisory, currently, buy-side investment advisory has become a “problem-solving” approach.

Using “Help You Invest” as an example, they pointed out that “Help You Invest” leverages AI technology and behavioral finance tools to interpret market signals, recognize user intentions, and accompany fluctuations, helping users manage short-term emotions and solidify long-term confidence. The holding duration of users has significantly increased compared to non-advisory users.

“This behavioral change has also translated into effective investment returns,” the person said.

Data provided indicates that by the end of 2025, over 90% of “Help You Invest” users will have achieved positive returns.

The person emphasized that this success fully demonstrates that buy-side investment advisory is playing an increasingly active role in guiding users to establish long-term investment concepts.

In addition to using technology, professional tools, and diverse methods to accompany investors and manage emotions—thus guiding their investment behavior toward “long money, long-term investment”—buy-side advisors also need to strengthen their professionalism and systematic approach in multi-asset allocation and risk control.

“Currently, in asset allocation, the ‘Help You Invest’ research team conducts quantitative analysis across macroeconomics, major asset classes, sub-style, yield, and risk dimensions, as well as qualitative research and in-depth investigation on strategies, industries, durations, and interest rate credit. They jointly provide asset allocation recommendations, focusing on the accumulation of long-term excess returns, turning small wins into big wins, and achieving the goal of long-term stable outperformance,” said the person from Ant Investment Advisory.

Meanwhile, in risk control, “Help You Invest” constructs a systematic, full-chain compliance risk management system from the perspective of user interests.

Specifically, “Pre-investment prudent access, strict control of target quality, graded management through ‘blacklist-graylist,’ and formulation of risk control standards for fund companies, fund managers, and products; centralized control during investment, with system rules and an investment decision committee jointly overseeing the rationality of investment operations; post-investment 24/7 monitoring, continuously tracking the performance fluctuations of advisory portfolios, investment ratios, fund risks, and client account statuses, with early warning measures to ensure smooth operation of the portfolios,” the person detailed.

Upholding the “Buy-side Stance,” Institutions Still Need to Improve Capabilities

Buy-side investment advisory plays an important role in guiding funds from short-term trading to long-term allocation. However, in reality, there are still some obstacles to effectively leveraging buy-side advisory tools or industry-wide progress toward buy-side advisory.

Among these, the lack of asset allocation tools is a concern among industry insiders.

The person in charge from Ant Investment Advisory admitted that the assets available for buy-side advisory are urgently in need of enrichment. Currently, on-exchange ETFs are not yet usable by advisors, and cross-border investment quotas are also scarce. In the future, enriching the toolkit of asset allocation tools for advisory services will greatly enhance the diversification of portfolios, better serving users’ long-term investment goals.

In addition, to enable buy-side advisory capabilities to be effectively utilized, or for institutions to walk steadily on this path, they must adhere to a true “buy-side stance.”

The person explained, “The buy-side stance is specifically reflected in product selection, strategy construction, and client expectation management.”

Among these, product selection must remain neutral, establishing an independent evaluation system across institutions and categories; strategy construction must ensure long-term effectiveness, dynamically optimizing around users’ long-term goals; client expectation management should calibrate goals throughout the entire process, achieving a dynamic match between expectations and experience.

Taking “Help You Invest” as an example, its research team builds a product selection system from user interests, including “initial screening—refined screening—quantitative analysis—field research—rating and scoring,” and conducts over a hundred one-on-one surveys annually to objectively and deeply investigate fund issuance companies, aiming to select funds from the entire market that are most suitable for long-term investment and balanced allocation.

At the same time, they continuously monitor the performance fluctuations of advisory portfolios based on market conditions and other factors, and dynamically adjust strategies; additionally, “Help You Invest” guides users to focus on whether their “long-term goals are still on track” through market signal interpretation, regular rebalancing reports, and ongoing fluctuation accompaniment services.

Regarding the development pattern of the buy-side advisory industry, the person said that traditional institutional brands have deep roots, with experienced offline advisory teams focusing on high-net-worth clients; third-party independent sales platforms focus on online user experience, leveraging agile product iteration and user responsiveness to continuously provide inclusive financial services to a broader investor base. “Various institutions are expanding their business based on their inherent strengths, and the industry ecosystem is evolving through mutual complementarity and learning.”

(Editor: Xia Xin; Review: Li Huimin; Proofreading: Yan Yuxia)