Beijing Enlight Media Co.,Ltd. (300251) had a closing market capitalization of 56.824 billion yuan on the last trading day before the holiday. In just two trading days, the company's market value evaporated by 6.66 billion yuan.
The National Day holiday has just ended, and while autumn brings crisp air, the film market's "winter" may have arrived early this year. According to Lighthouse Professional Edition data, 12 films were released during this year's National Day holiday period, covering various genres including war, fantasy, crime, animation, and romance, including two re-releases: "Avatar: The Way of Water" and "Jiangnan: Waiting for You Where Love Begins."
Despite the numerous and diverse films, according to China Film Administration statistics, this year's National Day holiday films only achieved a total box office of 1.835 billion yuan. Excluding the pandemic period, this has retreated to 2015 levels, when the National Day holiday total box office was 1.862 billion yuan.
The top 5 films by box office during this year's National Day holiday were: "The Volunteers: The Battle of Life and Death" with 450 million yuan, "731" with 345 million yuan, "The Adventure of the Writer 2" with 295 million yuan, "Life is Ruff" with 219 million yuan, and "Deafening" with 175 million yuan. Among these, "731" had already been released on September 18th but still secured second place in the National Day holiday box office rankings.
As of October 11th, only "The Volunteers: The Battle of Life and Death" successfully broke through the 500 million yuan barrier among National Day holiday films, reaching 502 million yuan.
Notably, this year's National Day holiday also saw the release of an animated film called "The Sky of Three Kingdoms Part One." The film was primarily invested by Guomai Culture, with Beijing Enlight Media Co.,Ltd.'s subsidiary Enlight Pictures participating as an investor and handling distribution.
The film had generated considerable buzz before its release, not only leveraging the major IP of "Three Kingdoms" but also featuring renowned writer and scholar Yi Zhongtian as screenwriter and producer, who also provided voice acting for characters in the film.
Despite these advantages, as of October 11th, after 11 days of release, the film has only earned 76.407 million yuan at the box office. Lighthouse Professional Edition and Maoyan Professional Edition predict the film's total box office at 88.963 million yuan and 82.259 million yuan respectively, both falling short of 100 million yuan. However, the film has received positive reviews, earning a 7.2 rating on Douban. Some viewers praised it as having "the fragrance of ink and scholarly books, neat and magnificent," while others noted "superior special effects technology but poor scriptwriting, which are common strengths and weaknesses of Chinese animation."
Possibly affected by the poor box office performance of "The Sky of Three Kingdoms Part One," Beijing Enlight Media's stock price declined after the holiday opening. According to Wind data, as of October 9th closing, Beijing Enlight Media's stock price closed at 17.33 yuan per share, down 10.53%. On October 10th, the company's stock price continued to decline slightly, falling 1.33% to close at 17.10 yuan per share, with a current total market capitalization of 50.164 billion yuan.
Beijing Enlight Media's closing market capitalization on September 30th, the last trading day before the holiday, was 56.824 billion yuan. In just two trading days, the company's market value evaporated by 6.66 billion yuan.
During this year's Spring Festival period, "NeZha: The New Hero's Birth," produced by Beijing Enlight Media, was released and ultimately grossed 15.446 billion yuan at the box office, not only becoming the "brightest star" of the Spring Festival period but also successfully reaching the top of China's all-time box office rankings.
According to Beijing Enlight Media's February 5th announcement regarding "NeZha: The New Hero's Birth" box office performance, when the film's box office reached 4.84 billion yuan, Beijing Enlight Media's revenue from the film was approximately 950 million to 1.01 billion yuan. Based on this ratio, Beijing Enlight Media's final revenue from this animated film was approximately 3.032 billion to 3.223 billion yuan.
The company's total revenue for 2024 was only 1.586 billion yuan, meaning the revenue from "NeZha: The New Hero's Birth" alone could potentially be more than double the entire 2024 annual revenue.
Indeed, Beijing Enlight Media's performance achieved significant growth in the first half of this year. According to the company's interim report, the company achieved operating revenue of 3.242 billion yuan in the first half of the year, a year-on-year increase of 143.00%, and realized net profit attributable to shareholders of 2.229 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 371.55%.
Beijing Enlight Media stated in its interim report that the company's film and derivative business revenue and profits both achieved substantial growth in the first half of the year. During this period, films in which the company participated in investment and distribution and were included in box office calculations included "NeZha: The New Hero's Birth" and "One and Only," among others.
As of the end of the first half of the year, "NeZha: The New Hero's Birth" had been released in 43 countries and regions, breaking box office records in 15 of them.
Perhaps due to "NeZha: The New Hero's Birth" performing far beyond expectations, Beijing Enlight Media stated in its interim report that the company's animation production team now exceeds 170 people and may expand to over 300 people in the next two years. This is expected to achieve production capacity of 1.5 to 2 high-quality animated films per year, providing stable support for the continued production of the company's "Mythology Universe" series works.
Currently, Beijing Enlight Media still has numerous animation projects in progress. Specifically, "Go to Your Island," "Rakshasa Sea Market," "Big Fish & Begonia 2," "Love Sickness," "North Wind," and "Grandma, There's a Fish in My Ear" are in production, while animation film projects including "Zhuolu," "Jiang Ziya 2," "Tea Ah Secondary 2," "Yesterday's Blue Sky 2," "Big Fish & Begonia 3," "Eight Immortals Cross the Sea," "Court of Dali Temple Diary," "Daji," "Erlang Shen," and "Lu Pan" are also being advanced.
Overall, Beijing Enlight Media has numerous animated film reserves. After the mediocre performance of "The Sky of Three Kingdoms Part One," which will be the next blockbuster hit and when it will appear can only be answered by time.
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