Ping'an Road Haoyang: 6.3% comprehensive investment return rate, how does the trillion-yuan insurance capital achieve high-value growth?

Ask AI · How Ping An Optimizes Its Investment Strategy Through Four Major Rebuilds?

In 2025, China Ping An delivered “steady growth” results: attributable operating profit of RMB 134.415 billion, up 10.3% year over year; non-GAAP net profit of RMB 143.773 billion, up 22.5%. Shareholders’ equity first crossed the one-trillion-yuan threshold, reaching RMB 100.0419 billion. At the March 27 earnings release, Ping An Group CFO Fu Xin described the full-year performance with the phrase “overall improvement, high-value growth.”

Behind the impressive performance, outstanding results on the investment side have played a major role. By the end of 2025, the scale of Ping An’s insurance funds investment portfolio reached RMB 6.49 trillion, up 13.2% from the beginning of the year. The comprehensive investment return rate was 6.3%, setting a new high in the past five years, and also significantly higher than the average 4.9% over the past decade.

After the earnings release, Tencent Finance and Ping An Group Deputy Chief Investment Officer Lu Haoyang discussed the matter exclusively. In Lu Haoyang’s view, the underlying logic of China’s domestic macroeconomy over the next 3–5 years will undergo four major rebuilds: growth-oriented logic rebuild, industrial momentum rebuild, global openness pattern rebuild, and capital market logic rebuild. Based on this judgment, Ping An has balanced its strategic scale of “fixed income to build the foundation, and equities to raise returns,” maintaining its fixed-income core base while, on one end, allocating to high-dividend and stable assets, and on the other end, investing in the growth directions of new quality productive forces. And the dividend/benefit strategy Ping An has been deep in for ten years is also evolving into a new form: “growth-oriented high dividends.”

Macroeconomic Outlook: Over the Next 3–5 Years, China’s Macroeconomy Will See Four Major Rebuilds

Based on the current domestic and international economic landscape, Lu Haoyang pointed out that over the next 3–5 years, the underlying logic of China’s macroeconomy will undergo an in-depth rebuild, which he summarizes into four dimensions:

First is the rebuild of the growth orientation, with greater emphasis on high-quality development; economic growth targets will be appropriately lowered relative to different development stages.

Second is the rebuild of industrial momentum: the industrial structure will be optimized faster, new drivers’ growth momentum will be released, and the country will gradually replace old drivers.

Third is the rebuild of the global openness pattern: the trend toward deglobalization intensifies, China proactively expands openness and broadens the map of diversified trade cooperation.

Fourth is the rebuild of capital market logic: the country strengthens mechanisms for the stable operation of the market, actively guides long-term capital into the market, consolidates the foundation for the market’s long-term development, and realizes a virtuous interaction between the capital market and the real economy.

These “four major rebuilds” are also the core basis for Ping An—managing more than RMB 6 trillion of insurance funds—when conducting long-term and value-based investments.

According to Ping An’s 2025 annual report, in Ping An’s insurance funds investment portfolio, the proportion of fixed-income financial assets is 73%. The company actively increases allocations to long-duration government bonds and high-quality credit bonds, matching liability characteristics to ease reinvestment pressure. At the same time, Ping An allocates on the equity side toward growth-type stocks in the direction of new quality productive forces, including technology, high-end manufacturing, and resource-related sectors—this is an active response to the “industrial momentum rebuild.”

By the end of 2025, the book value of Ping An’s stock assets had reached RMB 958.089 billion, up 119.05% from the end of 2024, and the proportion of total investment assets increased to 14.8%.

Allocation Strategy: “Fixed Income Builds the Foundation, Equities Raise Returns”; the Share of Equity-Type Assets Has Increased to 19.8%

In the face of a low interest-rate environment and complex geopolitical conditions, how do insurance funds seek balance between the “fixed-income core” and “seeking returns amid volatility”?

Lu Haoyang said that based on its judgment about the domestic macroeconomy over the next 3–5 years, Ping An adheres to an allocation strategy of “fixed income to build the foundation, and equities to raise returns.”

On one hand, it sticks to the fixed-income core base—using it as the ballast of allocations—to increase holdings of long-duration interest-rate bonds and high-quality credit bonds, matching liability attributes and easing reinvestment pressure. On the other hand, while keeping the fixed-income “territory” secure, and under controllable risk, it steadily increases allocations to equity assets and adopts a dumbbell structure: one side is stable stocks with high dividends and low valuations, and the other side is growth stocks in the direction of new quality productive forces. “Through diversified investment across the market, industries, and styles, we improve the return-to-risk ratio of the equity portfolio,” he said.

In Lu Haoyang’s view, fixed income is the ballast—ensuring the rigidity of payments on the liability side—while equities are the growth engine, capturing structural opportunities amid volatility. The two do not trade off against each other; they complement each other and together form Ping An’s strategic balance for surviving market cycles and achieving high-quality growth.

The execution effect of this strategy is directly reflected in Ping An’s investment performance. In 2025, Ping An’s insurance funds’ comprehensive investment return rate was 6.3%, and its average comprehensive investment return over the past 10 years has remained stable at 4.9%. By the end of 2025, the proportion of equity-type assets in Ping An’s insurance funds had increased to 19.8%, up from the previous year.

From the perspective of the holding structure, Ping An’s dumbbell strategy is implemented clearly. On one side are stable, high-dividend assets: as of the end of 2025, 57% of Ping An’s stock classifications are measured at FVTOCI (measured at fair value with changes recognized in other comprehensive income), contributing more than RMB 90 billion in pre-tax unrealized gains; since they are not included in profit, they directly strengthen net assets. On the other side is growth-oriented allocation: at the earnings release meeting, Ping An’s General Manager Xie Yonglin disclosed that the company’s investments have covered cutting-edge areas such as GPUs, robotics, next-generation semiconductors, and brain-computer interface technologies.

It is worth noting that Lu Haoyang specifically emphasized “steadily increasing allocations under controllable risk,” which reflects the稳健 tone of insurance funds as “patient capital.”

Dividend/Benefit Strategy: Allocate Early, Select Quality, and Build High-Dividend Targets With Growth Potential

In recent years, dividend/benefit assets have become a high-quality choice for risk aversion and for passing through market cycles thanks to their stable dividend income. However, as trading crowding continues to rise and valuations of underlying assets increase, some high-dividend stocks have seen their dividend yields shrink due to share-price上涨. The market has begun to doubt the sustainability of the dividend strategy.

On this issue, Lu Haoyang frankly said, “First of all, it’s fortunate that we allocated relatively early.”

He explained that as an institutional investor, over the past decade, Ping An has treated dividend/benefit assets as the ballast for navigating through cycles, emphasizing “allocating early” and “selecting the best high-dividend targets.” Over the past decade, “the return on dividend/benefit investments from the ballast portion has been very good.” This is also an important source of Ping An’s stable returns from the investment side. This hidden asset base is precisely the confidence Ping An has for navigating through cycles.

Specific holdings also confirm Ping An’s deep allocation to the dividend strategy. According to publicly reported information, as of the end of Q3 2025, Ping An Life’s stake in Agricultural Bank of China A shares is 4.913 billion shares, representing a 1.40% shareholding ratio of tradable shares, corresponding to a market value of approximately RMB 37.342 billion, making it the first-largest heavy-holding target among its A-share positions. For Postal Savings Bank of China A shares, its holding is 2.382 billion shares, with a market value of approximately RMB 12.793 billion, ranking as the second-largest heavy-holding stock. In the utilities sector, Ping An Life holds 125 million shares of China Power Investment, corresponding to a market value of approximately RMB 1.678 billion.

In addition to A shares, in 2025 Ping An Life continued to increase its holdings of bank H shares, building a high-dividend financial asset pool in the Hong Kong market. Among them, its shareholding ratio in Agricultural Bank of China H shares has reached 20.10%; its shareholding ratio in China Merchants Bank has risen to 20.07%; its shareholding ratio in Postal Savings Bank of China is 16.01%; and there is also a record of increasing holdings in Industrial and Commercial Bank of China.

Regarding current market changes in dividend/benefit assets, Lu Haoyang said that even if short-term trading heat increases, dividend assets still have long-term allocation value. Ping An, on one hand, stays committed to existing high-quality targets, and on the other hand, actively optimizes its dividend/benefit strategy by increasing allocations to high-dividend targets that also have growth characteristics.

He revealed that in the past, Ping An invested a large amount in traditional high-dividend targets, including banks, insurance, and others—these investments have already delivered very good returns. More importantly, because the allocation time was early and costs were low, when valued using accounting costs, the dividend yields of these targets remain very attractive. “It’s definitely much more cost-effective than buying now.”

Beyond traditional high dividends, Ping An is also expanding into growth-oriented high dividends. Lu Haoyang said, “We will also look for some growth-oriented high dividends. For these companies, over a very long period into the future, we can expect their profits to continue growing, and they can also maintain a relatively stable dividend payout ratio.” The key feature of these targets is that, as company profits keep growing, as long as the dividend payout ratio remains stable, the absolute dividend amount and the dividend yield calculated based on investors’ holding costs will both rise year by year.

“Just like how we allocated to banks ten years ago—back then the bank PB was very low; we are also looking for these kinds of high-dividend opportunities now,” Lu Haoyang said. Ping An’s dividend investments are always about positioning long-term value, not chasing short-term trading heat. This also means that Ping An’s long-term approach to dividend/benefit investing is not chasing today’s high dividend yields, but building allocations to high-quality assets with dividend-growth potential in the future.

Long-Term Returns: Total Cash Dividends of RMB 48.891 Billion, 14 Consecutive Years of Dividend Growth

As a role model for long-term return shareholders, Ping An has maintained dividend growth for 14 consecutive years. In 2025, the company plans to distribute a full-year dividend of RMB 2.70 per share, up 5.9%, for a total cash dividend amount of RMB 48.891 billion. This is rare not only in the insurance industry but across the entire financial industry. A stable growth dividend policy is both a continued return to shareholders and a reflection of the company’s strong confidence in its own profitability and cash flow.

Looking ahead, Lu Haoyang said Ping An will continue to adhere to long-termism, deepen value investing, keep pace with the four major rebuild trends in the macroeconomy, continue to optimize its allocation framework of “fixed income builds the foundation and equities improve efficiency,” refine its dividend/benefit investment strategy, seize opportunities in new quality productive forces, and conduct asset allocation with a long-term perspective—using robust strategies to navigate through market cycles.

At the performance briefing, Ping An’s Co-CEO Guo Xiaotao also provided a more complete explanation of this philosophy: “China Ping An is long-term capital—patient capital. So in our investment process, short-term volatility is not important to Ping An. What matters more is how to get through cycles, so as to provide long-term, stable, and sustainable returns for our customers and for our shareholders.”