is similar to Jia Ling in the 2024 Lunar New Year hit movie "Hot and Spicy". China's private capital, which once seized the local insurance industry and then deeply penetrated the A-share market through a lot of "cheap money", is now also on the " Lose weight” on the road.
Of course, even if they lose 100 kilograms of weight, no matter whether they take the initiative or are forced to do so, they may not receive a reward of 3.5 billion.
In fact, those all-powerful "barbarians" in the past have gradually withdrawn from banquets in recent years, and some of them can't even be found on the menu. Zhang Jun, the boss behind Fude Life Insurance, is one of the few private investment tycoons who still has a place at the table. Since
gradually penetrated and gained control in 2006, Fude Life Insurance has rapidly grown in scale using the "asset-driven liability" model, and has aggressively conquered cities and territories in the capital market, including real estate, banking, film and television, agricultural products, new energy, and many other fields. They all bear the mark of "Zhang Ji".
However, ten years later, in 2016, the insurance regulators, who had been doing nothing for a long time, began to tighten the reins. They emphasized that "insurance is the last name of insurance" and advocated focusing on the roots. Private insurance companies that had aggressively expanded and even become "inflated" had to put an emergency brake on the market.
Since then, Anbang and Tomorrow insurance companies have collapsed. Especially with Wu Xiaohui and Xiao Jianhua imprisoned, the insurance industry has experienced a wave of strong risk clearing. After Zhang Jun himself disappeared at a certain point, Fude Life Insurance gradually shed its fierce and flamboyant label.
The best way to kill Bai Yueguang is to take a look at Bai Yueguang now. The current operating conditions and investment territory of Fude Life Insurance have become a rare "specimen" for people to show and lament.
This is like another golden sentence from Luo Yin, a poet in the late Tang Dynasty who wrote "If you have wine now, you will be drunk now." - Even if the harvest is good, nothing will happen in the harvest.
Equity transfer layout Financial holdings
From the richest Chinese man Li Ka-shing to the godfather of Gome Huang Guangyu; from real estate tycoons Huang Chulong and Guo Yingcheng to Yao Zhenhua and Zhang Jun who are stirring up the insurance world, Chaoshan, located on the coast of the South China Sea, is like a gathering of "Oriental Jews" land. Various merchant legends have long filled this land of less than 20,000 square kilometers with mystery.
Before the fateful collision with Zhang Jun from Chaoshan, "Life Life" (the predecessor of Fude Life Insurance) was just a little-known life insurance company.
Life Insurance was established on March 4, 2002, with a registered capital of 1.02 billion yuan and its headquarters in Shanghai. At that time, its equity was held by eight shareholders, including Dalian Shide under Xu Ming, Shougang Group, Guangsheng Asset Management under the Guangdong Provincial State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission, Wuhan Wuxin Industrial and Wuhan Yili Technology controlled by the Zheng Yutong family of Hong Kong. The shareholding ratios of each company are relatively close.
In 2006, the two founding shareholders of Life Insurance withdrew, and Zhang Jun chose the opportunity to intervene. In April of that year, the capital contribution of 135 million yuan (accounting for 9.94%) held by Guangdong Guangsheng Asset Management Co., Ltd. was transferred to Shenzhen Guoli Investment Development Co., Ltd. (referred to as Guoli Investment Development) controlled by Zhang Jun. The investor also became the sixth largest shareholder of Sino Life Insurance. According to media statistics from
, Zhang Jun spent 11 billion yuan to win Life Insurance—remember, this was the price calculated 18 years ago. In March 2008, the headquarters of Life Insurance moved from Shanghai to Shenzhen, and in August of the same year, Zhang Jun became the chairman of the company.
In the five years from 2009 to 2013, Sino Life Insurance conducted ten rounds of capital increases, and its registered capital rose rapidly from more than one billion yuan to 11.752 billion yuan, and this number has been maintained to this day. At the end of 2014, the company's registered capital ranked fifth among mainland life insurance companies, behind Ping An Life, China Life, PICC Life and Huaxia Insurance (now Ruizhong Life).
The expansion of the liability side naturally needs to be balanced by the asset side. Zhang Jun, who is not willing to play the role of "passer-by", has made no secret of his ambitions for a financial holding empire, and the operation of insurance group operations has been difficult to stop. In 2012, Guoli Investment Development changed its name to Shenzhen Fude Financial Investment Holdings Co., Ltd. (referred to as Fude Financial Holdings), and the "Fude" financial holding platform began to take shape.
In July 2014, Fude Insurance Holdings Co., Ltd. (referred to as Fude Insurance Holdings) was approved for establishment. The sponsors were 6 companies including Fude Financial Holdings. In July of the following year, it was approved to open and became another large insurance group in China. . In order to promote the group business strategy, at the end of November 2014, Life Insurance changed its name to Fude Life Insurance - a very straightforward and flattering name in Guangdong.
Fude Insurance Holdings includes Fude Life Insurance, Fude Property & Casualty Insurance, Life Insurance Asset Management, Fude Insurance Sales and other companies, forming a conventional collaborative development structure for life insurance, property and casualty insurance, asset management and sales. According to the officially announced development strategy,
will gradually implement the preparations for the establishment of professional subsidiaries such as health insurance and pension insurance after it is officially opened for operation. What is interesting is that these "meanings in the title" have not yet been revealed.
Source: Official website of Fude Insurance Holdings Co., Ltd.
After several transfers of equity, the shareholder camp of Fude Life Insurance has undergone significant changes as expected: the earliest promoter shareholders withdrew one by one, and were mainly replaced by similar companies from Shenzhen. replaced. According to the latest industrial and commercial information, there are a total of 8 shareholders behind Fude Life Insurance.
Fude Life Insurance shareholder information
Picture source: wind
It is probably that running water is stable, but it is more likely to change with the times, and the adjustment of shareholder structure is still continuing. In April 2023, the official website of the China Banking and Insurance Regulatory Commission posted a "Reply from the Heilongjiang Supervisory Bureau of the China Banking and Insurance Regulatory Commission on the investment and equity participation of Harbin Bank Co., Ltd.". The above-mentioned approval shows that Harbin Bank was approved to transfer 587.0127 million shares of Fude Life Insurance held by Shenzhen Intercontinental Commerce Investment Co., Ltd., and the shareholding ratio after the participation was 4.99%.
According to Tianyancha, the name "Harbin Bank" has not yet appeared in the shareholder information of Fude Life Insurance. Note that Harbin Bank previously belonged to the financial territory of the Tomorrow Department, and even on the eve of the collapse of the building, when having to choose between Baoshang Bank and Baoshang Bank, Xiao, who still had illusions, chose the latter.
Currently, Shenzhen Fude Jinrong Holdings Co., Ltd. (referred to as Fude Jinrong Holdings) is the largest shareholder of Fude Life Insurance, holding 20% of the shares. After penetration, it can be found that it is wholly owned by Fude Holdings (Group) Co., Ltd., and the actual controller of the latter is Zhang Jun, holding 64% of the shares.
It is worth mentioning that Fude Jinrong Holdings changed its name three times - first from Guoli Investment Development to Fude Financial Holdings in 2012, and then to Shenzhen Fudehua Industrial Co., Ltd. on May 28, 2021 company. Only four days later, it was changed to Fude Jinrong Holdings on June 2 of that year.
From "finance" to "industrial" and then to "Jinrong", the several changes of names somewhat reveal the secretiveness and hesitation of Chaoshan bosses towards the financial holding platform. Perhaps, it also implies some special complex of private capital.
Real estate ebbs and investment shrinks
bang, bang, bang, guns are flying.
In the few years after Zhang Jun took control of the market, Fude Life Insurance relied on high-yield universal insurance to aggressively attack, and the scale of premiums expanded rapidly. Relying on his insurance license and strong financial backing, Zhang also behaves like a cowboy in the A-share capital market.
is like the protagonist in "Zhou Chu Eliminates Three Evils" - don't mess with me! Don't make a mistake! Don’t be dissatisfied! Since 2013, Fude Life Insurance has invested heavily in A-share and H-share listed companies, frequently staged sign-raising dramas, including Gemdale Group, Shanghai Pudong Development Bank, agricultural products, Kaisa, China Coal Energy, Shougang Resources, etc.
Among them, the sniper attack on Gemdale Group is undoubtedly one of the most memorable actions by the outside world. At the beginning of 2013, Fude Life Insurance began to invest in Gemdale Group, and has repeatedly increased its holdings since then. By the end of 2014, it held 1.347 billion shares, accounting for 29.99% of the total equity ratio. The market value at the end of the period was 15.4 billion yuan, making it the largest shareholder.
However, when the chameleon dives into the dyeing room, how can one color satisfy his appetite? After entering the real estate industry, in 2015, Fude Life Insurance set its sights on the financial industry - after all, its premiums exceeded 100 billion that year. During the year, Fude launched the Shanghai Pudong Development Bank four times at a cost of 68 billion yuan. By the end of the year, it held a total of 3.625 billion shares of the bank, accounting for 19.43%. The market value at the end of the period was 66.2 billion yuan, making it the second largest shareholder.This move is second only to Anbang's "heroic" move in the same period, when it increased its stake in Minsheng Bank to 22.51% within 2 months and became the largest shareholder.
has one, two, and three. While coveting a bank license, Fude Life Insurance also has the idea of a trust license. In August 2015, the former China Insurance Regulatory Commission issued an announcement, agreeing in principle to the acquisition of 93.44% of National Trust's equity by Fude Life Insurance through transfer. However, the approval from the former China Banking Regulatory Commission has been pending until June 2022, when the Beijing Banking and Insurance Regulatory Bureau agreed that Shanghai Chuangxin and Hengfengyu would transfer their total 40.72% equity holdings in National Trust to Fude Life Insurance. As a result, the latter finally became the largest shareholder of the National Trust.
The wave of investment from private insurance companies came in waves, but then receded quickly. In the second half of 2015, the heated "Bao-Wan dispute" triggered heated discussions in the market about the potential risks behind the promotion of private insurance funds. Since then, insurance supervision has gradually become stricter, and regulations on equity management of insurance companies have begun to be revised. Those "barbarians" standing at the door of listed companies were finally put under a "tightening curse."
In recent years, under the guidance of the "insurance is surnamed Bao" policy, "returning to protection" has become the main tone of the entire industry. The era when insurance companies were aggressive in the capital market is gone forever. Even if the decision-makers once again put forward the slogan of "welcoming patient capital" in early 2024, including the Shanghai Stock Exchange report after the market closed on March 4 that China Life and Xinhua Insurance had jointly raised 50 billion private equity funds and were ready to "enter the market to execute goods", that was clearly This is the exclusive hunting ground for “national” insurance companies.
Send a message to Dongyanggu Liquor Market, I was drunk for a long time, now I am so happy that I will shed tears for a long time. As the real estate industry enters a cold winter, many real estate companies have been hit by debt crises. Insurance companies that were previously keen on investing in real estate have been deeply implicated and have to shrink their front lines or change course. So, what is the current state of the investment landscape of Fude Life Insurance, which was once in the limelight?
Its famous work, Gemdale Group, has always been the focus of attention from the outside world. At the end of 2014, Gemdale Group's share price was 7.68 yuan (previous restoration price, the same below), reaching its highest point of 14.83 yuan in July 2020, and then entered an adjustment range. In April 2022, the company's stock price once again reached 14.74 yuan and then failed to recover. Especially in October last year, Ling Ke, who had been at the helm of Gemdale Group for 25 years, announced his resignation "due to physical reasons." This news caused the stock price to plunge. The closing price of the stock on March 1 this year was only 4.27 yuan.
Gemdale Group's stock price trend chart in the past five years
Source: wind
Since Gemdale Group's 2023 annual report has not yet been disclosed, and according to last year's third quarter report, the number of shares held by Fude Life Insurance in Gemdale Group has not changed, still 1.347 billion shares, accounting for With a ratio of 29.83%, it is the largest shareholder, with a market value of 9.2 billion yuan at the end of the period. And if you hold it until now, as of March 1 this year, the market value will only be 5.8 billion yuan.
The stock value of Fude Life Insurance at the end of the third quarter of last year has shrunk by more than 6 billion yuan compared with the end of 2014. However, it at least received significant dividends during the period. There are reports that Gemdale Group has paid dividends 22 times since its listing in 2001, and will continue to pay dividends even in the difficult year of 2022. According to incomplete statistics, Fude Life Insurance received a cumulative dividend of more than 7.2 billion yuan from 2014 to 2022.
But even so, Fude will not easily lend a helping hand to Gemdale, which is in a liquidity crisis. On December 22 last year, it was reported in the market that Gemdale intends to mortgage its landmark building Gemdale Center in Beijing CBD and apply for an operating property loan worth 7 billion yuan. Gemdale will have 8 domestic bonds maturing in 2024, with a total scale of 12.1 billion yuan, of which the maturing debt in the first quarter alone will reach 6 billion yuan. In fact, Gemdale's current non-current liabilities due within one year are as high as 40.8 billion, and the short-term debt ratio is less than 1, which means that monetary cash cannot cover short-term debts.
In addition to Gemdale Group, as of the end of the third quarter of last year, Fude Life Insurance also appeared among the top ten shareholders of four A-share listed companies, being the second largest shareholder of Shanghai Pudong Development Bank and Agricultural Products, and the largest shareholder of Beijing Culture Shareholder, the eighth largest shareholder of Bank of Chongqing.
The market value of these stocks has also shrunk to varying degrees. Among them, Fude Life Insurance holds 5.813 billion shares of Shanghai Pudong Development Bank, accounting for 18.81%. The market value at the end of the third quarter of last year was 41.3 billion yuan, a decrease of more than 20 billion yuan compared with the end of 2015.
Fude Life Insurance also started to hold agricultural products in 2013 and increased its holdings to 509 million shares by the end of the first quarter of 2015, with a market value of 7.7 billion yuan at the end of the period. At the end of the third quarter of last year, its shareholding remained unchanged, and the market value at the end of the period was 3.5 billion yuan; the company began to hold 150 million shares of Bank of Chongqing at the end of 2020, and the market value at the end of the first quarter of 2021 was 1.761 billion yuan, and the market value at the end of the third quarter last year was 1.232 billion billion. The shrinkage of Beijing Culture is even more impressive. At the end of the second quarter of 2016, Fude Life Insurance began to hold 112 million shares, with a market value of 2.626 billion yuan at the end of the period. The same number of shares held at the end of the third quarter of last year, the market value was only 689 million yuan, shrinking by as much as 74%.
From a fundamental point of view, among the listed companies holding shares, Shanghai Pudong Development Bank performed poorly. In the first three quarters of last year, the net profit attributable to the parent company fell 30.83% year-on-year, making it the worst performer among the 42 A-share listed banks; and as of the end of the third quarter, The bank's non-performing loan ratio is also relatively high among all listed joint-stock banks.
Beijing culture is even more worrying. In the first three quarters of 2023, the company's net profit attributable to its parent company was a loss of 135 million yuan. Not only did its performance change, the company was also riddled with lawsuits and heavily in debt. During this year's Spring Festival, Beijing Culture, which collaborated with Jia Ling on "Hello, Li Huanying" with a box office of 5.3 billion, has completely disappeared from the list of producers of "Hot and Spicy".
Business consolidation, performance fluctuations
Universal insurance is popular because of its dual functions of protection and investment. However, there are always two sides to a coin, and its emergence has also disrupted the traditional pattern of China's insurance market.
In 2010, the regulatory authorities launched new insurance investment policies to further relax investment channels for insurance companies. You can go to the capital market to capture opportunities and allow universal insurance funds to find an outlet. Therefore, the development of universal insurance has become a magic weapon for some insurance companies to overtake in corners. Anbang Insurance (now Dajia Insurance), Huaxia Insurance, Fude Life Insurance, etc. have all taken advantage of the universal insurance trend to become upstarts in the industry, and have adopted the "asset-driven liability" model. Play "very 6".
From 2015 to 2016, the scale of universal insurance business reached its peak. Data show that the growth rate of local universal insurance premiums in 2015 was 95.2%. As of October 2016, universal insurance premiums exceeded 1 trillion yuan, accounting for 33.5% of all personal insurance premiums.
In 2014, Fude Life Insurance ranked eighth among personal insurance companies with premiums of 69.5 billion yuan. In 2015, its premiums increased by 137% to 165.2 billion yuan, second only to China Life and Ping An Life. Ranking third, it has become the biggest challenger to established insurance companies.
According to reports, in early 2016, at the 2016 annual work conference held by Fude Life Insurance, Zhang Jun proposed the strategic goal of "comprehensively entering the first group and creating a first-class industry benchmark" within five years.
The heroic words are still in my ears, but the story suddenly takes a turn.
In the second half of 2016, regulators took heavy measures to rectify the chaos in universal insurance. Many "large universal insurance companies" were required to make rectifications. Those who failed to make rectifications were even subject to strict regulatory measures such as suspending Internet insurance business and banning product declarations. A crazy game finally sounded the "game over" prompt.
This year, Fude Life Insurance became a key regulatory target of the regulatory authorities, and various research groups and working groups entered the company one after another. Zhang Jun was taken away by relevant departments to assist in the investigation and disappeared from public view for a long time.
In 2017, new policyholders’ investment payments in the life insurance industry (mainly universal insurance premiums) dropped sharply by 50%, with their proportion falling from 34.39% in the previous year to 18.19%. That year, the scale of Fude Life Insurance's premiums was 117.4 billion yuan, a drop of more than 30%, and it once again returned to eighth place in the industry.
Judging from the annual report, the company's original premium income also showed a shrinking trend after 2016. In 2016, its insurance business revenue exceeded 100 billion, reaching 102.2 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 29.34%. From 2017 to 2020, these values were 80.4 billion yuan, 71.7 billion yuan, 51.3 billion yuan, and 60.8 billion yuan respectively, with year-on-year growth rates of -21.31%, -10.79%, -28.46%, and 18.46% respectively. Changes in
's profit indicators can also reflect the ups and downs of the market that the company has experienced. Annual report shows. In 2010, Fude Life Insurance's net profit was only 98 million yuan. It increased significantly to 2.472 billion yuan in 2014 and reached a peak of 4.505 billion yuan in 2015. However, it suddenly took a turn for the worse in 2016, with a loss of 5.061 billion yuan, which did not recover until 2019. Profitable, achieving a net profit of 1.982 billion yuan, which dropped sharply to 111 million yuan in 2020.
Source: Fulde Life Insurance Annual Report
In 2021 and 2022, Fule Life Insurance did not disclose an annual report for two consecutive years, and the solvency report that was supposed to be released every quarter also came to an abrupt end after the fourth quarter of 2021. The company said it had been granted a moratorium on disclosing solvency information under solvency regulatory rules. In April this year, it is still a mystery whether the new financial report and solvency report can be released.
According to reports, at the end of 2022, Zhang Jun returned to work in a low-key manner, began to organize and participate in various important meetings, and made new personnel arrangements for his companies. In his internal speech, he said that adjustments would be made to corporate governance and cadre selection. “In the future, only truly doing insurance and pursuing long-termism is the right path to development,” he stressed.
In 2023, a series of personnel changes have indeed surfaced. On February 28, the industrial and commercial information of Fude Holdings (Group) Co., Ltd. changed. Zhang Jun was changed from general manager to chairman. The general manager position was held by Huang Xiaodong, and more than ten directors, supervisors and senior members were added in one fell swoop.
One day later, Fude Life Insurance issued an announcement on major matters. After deliberation and approval at the 92nd extraordinary meeting of the fifth board of directors, Zhang Hanping was approved to resign as the general manager of the company, and Xu Wenyuan was appointed as the interim person in charge to act as the general manager.
Times have changed, and everything seems to be calm. However, the complex internal and external environment is like snow flakes on the windshield, making the road ahead still blurry.
In the past two years, China's local insurance agents have lost a large number of insurance agents and the capital market has continued to be weak. The insurance industry has encountered profitability difficulties and transformation pains. In 2023, due to pressure on the investment side, the net profits of insurance companies will generally be dragged down. The third-quarter reports submitted by the five A-share listed insurance companies made investors sigh: the net profits attributable to the parent companies in the first three quarters all declined. As the fourth quarter solvency reports are disclosed one after another, statistics show that 35 of the 60 unlisted life insurance companies suffered losses last year, accounting for 58%. Another noteworthy change is that local state-owned assets have increasingly become the main force in increasing capital and shares of small and medium-sized insurance companies. At this moment, they are probably the only ones who can take out real money.
Obviously, it is difficult for Fude Life Insurance to be immune to the current general trend.
"yolo", which is the abbreviation of the English title of "Hot and Spicy", the full name is "you only live once" - you only live once in a lifetime.
In fact, Zhang Jun may not necessarily support this movie that is not funded by his own company, but as a person from Chaoshan, he should remember another classic poem by Luo Yin in the late Tang Dynasty: "Every time comes, heaven and earth all work together, and heroes are not free when they are transported."
