Rising raw material costs weighed on performance, though the company did secure 300 million yuan in dividends from Yinwang.
A loss of 1.717 billion yuan has flipped SERES into the red for the first half of 2026, reversing a profit from the same period last year.
On August 19, Seres Group Co.,Ltd. released its interim financial report for the first half of 2026. Revenue for the period came in at over 57.4 billion yuan, down 7.9% year-on-year, while the net loss attributable to shareholders reached 1.717 billion yuan, a decline of 158.4% compared to the prior year. This marks the company's first loss-making financial report since its listing on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange on November 5, 2025.
On the gross margin front, SERES posted a gross margin of 21.80% in the first half of the year, down 4.7 percentage points year-on-year.
In terms of sales volume, new energy vehicle deliveries reached 178,800 units in the first half of 2026, a year-on-year increase of 3.87%. Among these, SERES brand vehicle sales totaled 160,800 units, up 5.6% year-on-year.
On the R&D front, SERES invested 7.007 billion yuan in research and development during the first half of 2026, a 34.8% year-on-year surge, reflecting the company's continued commitment to deepening its technological capabilities.
As for its cash position, SERES held cash reserves of 73.148 billion yuan as of the end of the first half of 2026.
Beyond the financial data, SERES also disclosed progress on its investment in Yinwang Intelligence. The company previously acquired a 10% stake in Yinwang for 11.5 billion yuan in cash. As of June 30, 2026, the book value of this investment stood at 11.514 billion yuan, accounting for roughly 8.97% of the group's total assets. During the first half of the year, SERES received cash dividends of 300 million yuan from Yinwang.
In its earnings report, SERES explained the factors behind its interim performance. Revenue was primarily driven by new energy vehicle products, which contributed 92.60% of total turnover. The group booked 57.419 billion yuan in revenue for the half, down 7.9% year-on-year, largely due to a shift in product mix. During the second quarter, key models were in a transition phase between product generations, meaning production capacity and sales scale effects had not yet been fully realized.
Gross profit for the first half stood at 12.522 billion yuan, down 24.3% from 16.531 billion yuan in the same period of 2025. The decline was attributed to rising prices for key raw materials such as memory chips, industrial metals, and lithium carbonate, as well as changes in the product sales structure.
As for the profit slump, the company said it chose not to cut corners on component quality standards to pass on the higher upstream raw material costs. Instead, it held firm to its premium supply chain standards, which put temporary pressure on operating profit during the period.
In June, SERES Group Chairman Zhang Xinghai noted at the 2026 China Auto Chongqing Forum that memory chip prices had surged fivefold, climbing from roughly 20 yuan per unit to nearly 100 yuan per unit. Lithium carbonate prices had also jumped from 80,000 yuan to 180,000 yuan per ton compared to the same period last year. For the AITO brand, this translates to an average cost increase of 15,000 to 20,000 yuan per vehicle.
Meanwhile, as the industry's transformation deepens and automotive technology innovation enters a phase of multi-path parallel breakthroughs, L3 autonomous driving has become the inevitable route for mass commercialization of passenger vehicle autonomy. In this context, SERES recorded impairment losses on certain existing assets with limited adaptability. The combination of these factors squeezed its first-half profitability.
Despite near-term challenges, SERES has maintained a degree of operational resilience. With 73.148 billion yuan in cash on hand, the company has the resources to intensify technology investment and accelerate the commercialization of its technological achievements.
On the technology front, during the first half of 2026, SERES leveraged a unified platform-based technology foundation to achieve breakthroughs across multiple areas, including underlying architecture, core systems, experience innovation, and AI and digital intelligence applications. These include the development of a multi-dimensional redundant electronic and electrical architecture featuring a "global brain plus backup cerebellum," 800V high-voltage platform breakthroughs for both range-extended and pure electric vehicles, and a holographic spatial perception network enabling full-dimensional in-cabin sensing.
On the model front, the all-new AITO M9 has delivered over 20,000 units in the seven weeks since large-scale deliveries began on June 16. The starting price of the M9 Ultimate version has been raised to over 600,000 yuan, further expanding the price range and customer base covered by the AITO product lineup.
With cash reserves exceeding 73 billion yuan, iterative breakthroughs in its full-domain technology platform, and rapid ramping of the high-end M9 model, SERES has built a foundation to weather short-term volatility while accumulating momentum for long-term growth.
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