A marketing revolution is underway, shifting from "keyword ranking" to "AI answer priority," as Media ETF Huaxia (Code: 516190) surged for two consecutive trading days, showing clear signs of heavy capital inflow.
When Musk announced plans to open-source the content recommendation algorithm for platform X within a week, the market immediately realized: the era of GEO (Generative Engine Optimization) has truly arrived.
On January 12th, the A-share media sector experienced a wave of limit-up gains. Leo Group and Yidian Tianxia hit consecutive limit-up boards, Gravitation Media saw five limit-ups in six trading days, while BlueFocus, Kunlun Tech, and Chinese Online all surged by the 20% limit. Media ETF Huaxia (516190), which tracks the CSI Entertainment Media Index, followed its substantial 8.41% gain last Friday with another surge exceeding 8% today, continuing to attract large capital inflows.
Behind this surge is investors making precise allocations targeting the trillion-yuan market potential unleashed by the GEO revolution.
The GEO revolution involves a fundamental restructuring of traffic gateways, reshaping the value chain of the marketing industry.
GEO is an optimization strategy targeting generative AI platforms, with the core objective of ensuring a company's brand, product, or service is prioritized and accurately recommended within AI-generated responses.
Unlike the keyword stuffing characteristic of traditional SEO, GEO requires content to possess logical consistency, data authority, and emotional resonance. Brokerage research reports indicate that rapidly growing products like AI search and AI assistants are poised to drive an upgrade in search methods and a restructuring of user traffic gateways, potentially making them the primary channels for information distribution in the AI era.
It is foreseeable that advertiser demand is shifting from "ranking priority" (SEO) to "answer priority" (GEO), a transformation that is driving innovation and changes in the landscape of marketing and media business models.
According to estimates from the Marketing Science Academy, the GEO market size in China is projected to be approximately 2.9 billion RMB in 2025, and $11.2 billion globally; by 2030, the Chinese market is expected to reach 24 billion RMB, exceeding $100 billion globally.
The cultural tourism industry has already demonstrated the power of GEO. For example, a leading scenic spot, after GEO optimization, saw a 200% increase in the exposure of its official guides within AI recommendation engines, directly driving a 35% growth in ticket bookings.
The migration from "keyword retrieval" to "generative AI dialogue" marks a fundamental restructuring of traffic gateways. The value of media companies controlling authoritative information sources is being reassessed—the convergence of large language models on reliable sources grants monopolistic exposure to high-quality content.
Media ETF Huaxia offers a precise positioning in the core GEO sector.
The core investment thesis for the GEO sector hinges on its accelerating penetration rate. Some institutions forecast that GEO's penetration rate in digital marketing will surpass 40% by the end of 2026, significantly higher than the 15% for traditional SEO.
For investors, how should they position themselves to capture the investment opportunities presented by the GEO revolution?
Analysis shows that Media ETF Huaxia (516190), as an ETF product tracking the CSI Entertainment Media Index, has a constituent portfolio that highly overlaps with "GEO concept" stocks, making it a potential primary investment vehicle for gaining exposure to the GEO revolution.
This ETF provides one-click diversification into leading AI application companies, covering core areas such as online retail, advertising and marketing, film and television publishing, gaming, and digital media. Its top ten holdings include GEO concept leaders like Focus Media, Giant Network, BlueFocus, and Kunlun Tech.
Table: Top Ten Holdings of the CSI Entertainment Media Index
During the January 12th surge of "GEO concept" stocks, a large number of Media ETF Huaxia's heavy-weighted holdings hit limit-up, with BlueFocus, Kunlun Tech, and Chinese Online surging by the 20% limit.
This high degree of overlap is not coincidental but relates to the positioning of the CSI Entertainment Media Index. The index selects listed companies involved in businesses aligned with new technology and consumption trends—such as video, live streaming, gaming, film, digital marketing, and online education—which are precisely the core beneficiaries of the GEO revolution.
As of January 9th, 2025, the year-to-date return for this ETF fund had reached a significant 13.15%, while its return over the past year stood at 52.38%, both substantially outperforming the CSI 300 Index's respective returns of 2.79% and 25.9% over the same periods.
With some "GEO concept" stocks still trending towards consecutive limit-ups, making direct purchases difficult for investors, savvy investors have already gained indirect exposure through Media ETF Huaxia, which saw net subscription units exceed 11 million on January 9th.
From a long-term perspective, as AI search and comprehensive assistants become increasingly ubiquitous, the fundamental shift in how users access information—where traditional "searching" is being replaced by "conversing"—positions GEO optimization as an essential battleground for corporate marketing. The investment opportunities presented by the GEO revolution may just be beginning. Media ETF Huaxia not only covers core GEO targets but also captures key drivers in the AI application layer.
Amid the three major trends of traffic gateway reshaping, conversion chain reconstruction, and frequent event catalysts, Media ETF Huaxia possesses significant long-term allocation value.
MACD golden cross signals have formed, indicating positive momentum for these stocks!
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