Four departments have jointly issued measures to strengthen the layout planning and investment direction guidance for government investment funds. On January 12, the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) announced that, to enhance the planning of government investment fund layouts and their guidance, with a greater emphasis on government guidance and policy orientation, the NDRC, Ministry of Finance, Ministry of Science and Technology, and Ministry of Industry and Information Technology have formulated the "Work Measures for Strengthening the Layout Planning and Investment Direction Guidance of Government Investment Funds (Trial)". Simultaneously, the NDRC established the "Administrative Measures for the Investment Direction Evaluation of Government Investment Funds (Trial)" to guide these funds in implementing national industrial regulation requirements and supporting the construction of a modern industrial system.
The China-EU electric vehicle case has achieved a "soft landing." On January 12, the Ministry of Commerce released a notice regarding the progress of consultations on the case. According to the notice, the European side will issue "Guidance Documents on Submitting Price Undertaking Applications." Industry insiders indicated that this signifies the case has reached a soft landing after multiple rounds of negotiations. The notice stated that, to implement the consensus reached during the China-EU leaders' meeting and properly resolve the EU's anti-subsidy investigation into Chinese electric vehicles, both sides conducted several rounds of consultations based on mutual respect. They agreed on the necessity of providing general guidance on price undertakings to Chinese exporters of pure electric vehicles to the EU, enabling them to address relevant concerns in a more practical, targeted, and WTO-compliant manner.
Driven by both policy and capital, brain-computer interface (BCI) technology is accelerating its implementation and commercialization. Clinical achievements, such as quadriplegic patients controlling devices with their minds, continue to emerge. In the non-invasive sector, unicorn company BrainCo completed a significant financing round of approximately 2 billion yuan, setting the second-largest financing record globally in this field. Policy support has added another key pillar, with Sichuan province clarifying pricing for invasive BCI medical services. At the beginning of 2026, China's BCI industry is benefiting from a triple boost of technological breakthroughs, capital injection, and policy empowerment, leading to a full-scale acceleration of its commercialization process.
Zhejiang Province plans to introduce policies to promote the innovative development and comprehensive empowerment of artificial intelligence. Recently, the Zhejiang Provincial Department of Economy and Information Technology solicited public opinions on the "Zhejiang Province '16th Five-Year' Plan for the Digital Economy and Digital Infrastructure (Draft for Comments)". The draft proposes that during the "16th Five-Year" period, efforts will be made to drive the innovative development and comprehensive empowerment of AI, activating the momentum of digital technology innovation and data elements. The draft noted that during the "14th Five-Year" period, Zhejiang continued to polish its "golden name card" of the digital economy, becoming the only province (municipality) in China approved to build both a National Comprehensive Pilot Zone for Data Elements and a National Pilot Zone for Innovation and Development of the Digital Economy. The value-added of core digital economy industries reached 1.1 trillion yuan, cultivating two trillion-level clusters (Intelligent IoT and High-end Software) and several hundred-billion-level clusters. The number of 5G base stations per 10,000 people ranked among the top provinces in the country, and the level of public data openness led nationally. However, the plan also directly addresses shortcomings, acknowledging deficiencies in areas such as the layout of new digital industry tracks and the capacity for digital technology origination.
For the first time at the national level, systematic regulations have been established for government investment funds, addressing where to invest, how to invest, and who manages them. Recently, the NDRC, together with the Ministry of Finance, Ministry of Science and Technology, and Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, jointly released the "Work Measures for Strengthening the Layout Planning and Investment Direction Guidance of Government Investment Funds (Trial)" (referred to as the "Work Measures"). The NDRC also simultaneously issued the "Administrative Measures for the Investment Direction Evaluation of Government Investment Funds" (referred to as the "Management Measures"). Among these, the "Work Measures" provide a precise "roadmap" for the layout and investment direction of government funds, clarifying key investment areas, prohibited investment areas, and prohibited investment behaviors.
Driven by the simultaneous demand from power grid infrastructure and AI data centers (AIDC), the transformer industry continues to experience high prosperity. Since the start of 2026, many transformer manufacturers have seen a surge in orders, and the A-share transformer sector has followed with a sustained upward trend. Driven by the dual forces of accelerated global grid construction and AIDC demand, Jinpan International Ltd. recently signed a 696 million yuan contract to supply power products to an overseas customer. Companies including Eaglerise Electric & Electronic, TBEA Co., Ltd., and Jiangsu Huachen Transformer Co., Ltd. have reported full order books.
Over one hundred A-share companies have issued their 2025 performance forecasts, with the technology and biopharmaceutical sectors showing strong growth. Data shows that as of January 12, approximately 130 listed companies on the A-share market had disclosed their 2025 performance forecasts. Among them, about 70 companies forecast positive results (including pre-increase, slight increase, turning a profit from loss, and continued profit), with around 20 companies expecting to double their net profit year-on-year. In terms of industry distribution, companies in sectors such as electronics, semiconductors, pharmaceuticals and biologics, and mechanical equipment have shown impressive performance.
The price of lithium carbonate has broken through 150,000 yuan per ton, fueling high expectations of a "stockpiling rush" for lithium batteries and indicating a continued climb in industry prosperity. On January 12, the main lithium carbonate futures contract continued to soar, hitting the daily limit-up (a 9% increase) and closing at 156,060 yuan per ton. Spot prices moved in tandem with futures; data showed that on January 12, the average price of battery-grade lithium carbonate (evening session) was reported at 153,400 yuan per ton, an increase of 13,800 yuan from the previous trading day, once again hitting a new high for the past year.
The optimization of the "dual discount" policy is imminent, and the range of loan handling institutions is expected to expand. The first State Council executive meeting of 2026, held recently,部署 implemented a package of policies for fiscal and financial coordination to boost domestic demand. Focusing on promoting resident consumption, the meeting明确 stated that it would optimize the implementation of discount interest policies for loans to service industry entities and for personal consumption loans (the "dual discount" policy), aiming to increase the supply of high-quality services and enhance residents' consumption capacity. Several industry insiders suggested that expanding the range of handling institutions, dynamically adjusting the policy's support scope, and breaking down data barriers between government departments and financial institutions to streamline the approval process are all potential directions for future policy optimization.
Focusing on the hard tech track, merger and acquisition (M&A) funds are seeing simultaneous growth in both scale and quality. Driven by the policy dividends of the CSRC's "Six M&A Measures," China's M&A fund market experienced explosive growth in 2025, with both the number of new funds and the scale of fundraising hitting record highs. Investment focused on hard tech sectors like semiconductors and biopharmaceuticals, forming a new pattern of industrial integration characterized by "state capital leading and corporate collaboration." Data from CVSource by ChinaVenture showed that as of December 1, 2025, 29 new M&A funds were established domestically, with a target fundraising scale of approximately 105 billion yuan. Compared to the full year of 2024, the number of new establishments increased by 70% year-on-year, and the target fundraising scale increased by over 200%, indicating a significant trend of capital concentration towards hard tech.
Valuation games in semiconductor M&A are intensifying, with differentiated pricing becoming a consensus among parties. In 2025, a wave of M&A and restructuring swept A-share semiconductor listed companies, with the number of M&A cases increasing by over 15% year-on-year. The purpose of restructuring became more focused on asset integration and strategic cooperation. Simultaneously, the failure rate of semiconductor M&A deals also rose. Several industry insiders noted that despite increased regulatory tolerance, the current valuation gap between primary and secondary markets in the semiconductor industry has become a major reason for M&A failures. The difficulty for buyers and sellers to reach consensus on core terms such as valuation and performance commitments has increased. Some insiders recommend that parties adopt differentiated M&A strategies or use M&A funds for staged incubation to reduce the risk of failure in semiconductor M&A deals.
Multiple regions have publicized cement capacity replacement plans, signaling the industry's transformation is entering a deep-water zone. Against the backdrop of continuously shrinking market demand and prominent supply-demand contradictions, the cement industry is undergoing a profound transformation centered on capacity replacement. Recently, several provinces have intensively publicized supplementary capacity replacement plans for cement enterprises. This is both a response to national capacity control policies and an important signal that the industry is moving away from disorderly overproduction towards compliant and high-quality development.
Lithium extraction from salt lakes has welcomed another technological breakthrough. On January 12, the official website of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) showed that a research team from the Qinghai Institute of Salt Lakes, CAS, has recently made a major technological breakthrough in the separation of lithium resources from salt lakes, successfully overcoming the bottleneck of efficiently separating lithium, sodium, and potassium ions from lithium precipitation mother liquor. Concurrently, Qinghai Province has built the world's first 10,000-ton-scale industrial demonstration line for extracting battery-grade lithium carbonate from salt lake lithium precipitation mother liquor using solvent extraction.
Is the storage industry entering a "super bull market"? Terminal products like mobile phones and laptops are being forced to adjust prices. On January 12, market research firm Counterpoint Research released its monthly memory price tracker report for the storage market, formally declaring that the global storage industry has entered a "super bull market" phase, with the current market conditions even surpassing the historical peak of 2018. Driven by surging AI computing demand and server expansion, the bargaining power of DRAM and NAND Flash suppliers has reached historically high levels. The report shows that storage prices surged over 40% in the fourth quarter of 2025 and are expected to rise another 40% to 50% in the first quarter of 2026, with a further potential increase of about 20% in the second quarter of 2026.
The cancellation of VAT export tax rebates is conducive to the survival of the fittest in the photovoltaic industry. According to an announcement recently issued by the Ministry of Finance and the State Taxation Administration regarding the adjustment of export tax rebate policies for products like photovoltaics, the VAT export tax rebate for PV products will be canceled effective April 1, 2026. "Canceling the VAT export tax rebate effectively increases the costs for module exporting companies," said Zheng Tianhong, a senior photovoltaic analyst at Shanghai Metals Market, in an interview. Taking the 210R module as an example, canceling the rebate is equivalent to a potential profit reduction of 46 to 51 yuan per module exported.
From a scale sprint to structural optimization, automakers' 2026 sales targets reveal a new development logic. At the beginning of 2026, several automakers intensively disclosed their annual sales targets for the year. New force automakers, represented by Leapmotor, NIO, and Xiaomi Auto, generally prioritize "scale leapfrogging." In contrast, traditional independent automakers like Geely Auto, Chery Group, Dongfeng Motor, and Great Wall Motors emphasize "seeking progress while maintaining stability," with relatively restrained target growth rates. The keywords given by multiple institutions and industry organizations for China's auto market in 2026 are "under pressure," "destocking," and "intensifying competition," further explaining the differentiated logic behind automakers' target setting.
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