On the evening of September 3, Ping An of China announced that it had repurchased 532,100 A shares on the same day, with the highest price of 50.95 yuan per share and the lowest price of 50.72 yuan per share, at a cost of 27,055,800 yuan. This is the sixth consecutive trading day since Ping An announced the repurchase plan on August 26, and the cumulative repurchase amount has exceeded 2.7 billion yuan.
However, what is more noteworthy is that the company’s soul figure and chairman Ma Mingzhe personally went down to buy shares in the secondary market at a cost of about 2 million yuan. This is the first time. In addition to Ma Mingzhe, Ping An has six other directors, supervisors and senior executives who have also increased their holdings in the secondary market.
Six trading days since the implementation of the repurchase, Ping An’s A-shares remained weak as a whole, with a shock increase of about 2.8%.
The repurchase cost 2.7 billion for six consecutive trading days
Since the beginning of this year, it has been affected by a series of factors such as the poor performance of the life insurance business, the adjustment of the agent team, and the large impairment of China Fortune Investment , Ping An’s stock price has been falling. As of the close on August 26, Ping An’s A-share stock price was 50.30 yuan per share, and its total market value fell below one trillion to 928.9 billion yuan. Since the beginning of this year, the company’s A-share stock price has fallen by more than 41%.
In this context, on the evening of August 26, Ping An announced a repurchase plan of up to tens of billions at the same time that it was lower than market expectations on the evening of August 26, in order to boost market confidence. Ping An announced that it plans to use its own funds of RMB 5 billion to RMB 10 billion to repurchase A shares in the next 12 months with the approval of the board of directors, and the repurchase price will not exceed RMB 82.56 per share. At the same time, Ping An said that the company’s directors, supervisors, and senior executives will simultaneously increase their holdings during this period.
After the plan was announced, Ping An acted relatively quickly. On the second day, it repurchased 570,400 A shares for the first time in the secondary market, with a total payment of 29,374,100 yuan, and the lowest transaction price was 51.19 yuan per share.The highest transaction price was 51.96 yuan/share. Ping An of China has repurchased continuously for the next five trading days. As of September 3, it has repurchased 54.908 million shares in six trading days, with a total cost of more than 2.7 billion yuan.
Ma Mingzhe rare shot
At the same time as the company repurchases, Ping An's executives in China are also acting collectively.
According to data disclosed by the Shanghai Stock Exchange, on August 31, Ping An’s general manager Xie Yonglin and supervisor Sun Jianyi took the lead and bought 9,800 shares and 100,000 shares, respectively, at a cost of about 510,000 yuan and 5.16 million yuan. . On September 2, supervisor Gu Liji bought 1,000 shares at a cost of about 52,000 yuan. By September 3, more directors, supervisors, and senior executives joined the ranks of increasing holdings, including director Cai Fangfang, executive Hu Jianfeng, and executive Zhang Xiaolu.
The most interesting thing is that Ma Mingzhe also bought 40,000 shares at an average price of 51.4 yuan at a cost of 2.05 million yuan. So far, the seven directors, supervisors and senior executives have increased their holdings by more than 170,000 shares after the announcement of the repurchase, with a total amount of more than 9 million yuan.
The fund manager discovered that Ma Mingzhe directly bought stocks in the secondary market. This is the first time since Ping An of China listed on the A-share market in March 2017. Prior to this time, although Ma Mingzhe had made many moves to increase or decrease his holdings in the past 14 years, they were basically realized through participation in the employee stock ownership plan.
Regarding Ma Mingzhe’s direct bid in the secondary market, investors also have mixed opinions and some believe that the absolute amount of increase in holdings is extremely small for Ma Mingzhe.Some think it represents a posture and obviously has a positive effect on enhancing market confidence.
It is worth mentioning that from 2015 to 2019, Ping An has implemented a core personnel shareholding plan for five consecutive years, costing about 600 million yuan each year, each time the company is involved There are about 1,200 core personnel, and directors, supervisors and senior executives headed by Ma Mingzhe are involved.
announced that the stock price still hit a four-year low after the repurchase
rose 2.8% in six trading days
After Ping An announced the repurchase on the evening of August 26, the stock price changed the next day Obviously, it rose by about 3.5%, but fell back two days later, falling 2.48% and 1.6%, respectively, hitting a new low of 48.88 yuan in the past four years. There has been a rebound in the past three trading days, and Ping An has risen 2.8% overall since the repurchase announcement at the close of trading on September 3.
Previously, people in the industry said to the fund manager that the A-share white horse repurchase has generally been ineffective this year, and even fell into the dilemma of falling more and more repurchases this year. It is that many company repurchases are not directly written off to increase earnings per share, but used for employee stock ownership plans or equity incentives. In essence, they sell high and buy low, and compete with the market. The repurchase of Ping An of China is all used for employee stock ownership plans.
The semi-annual report recently released by Ping An of China shows that in the first half of 2021, the company achieved total operating income of 635.65 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 0.9%; realized operating profit of 81.836 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 10.1%, and net profit attributable to the parent of 580.05 100 million yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 15.5%.
From the perspective of the financial report, it is mainly affected by adjustments such as impairment provision for related investments of China Fortune Fortune .According to the data, Ping An’s 2021 half-year impairment provision, valuation adjustments and other equity adjustments for China Fortune-related investments totaled 35.9 billion yuan, reducing the company’s 2021 half-year 2021 after-tax net profit attributable to the parent by 20.8 billion yuan. Reduce the operating profit attributable to the parent in the first half of 2021 by 6.1 billion yuan.
After the mid-term report was released, a number of brokerages released research reports. Tianfeng Securities said that the liability side of Ping An Life Insurance has entered an adjustment period. The agency team, NBV growth, and operating profit growth are all under pressure. It is expected that the adjustment trend will continue until next year. However, Tianfeng Securities believes that with the elimination of "outdated production capacity", the life insurance reform has gradually established "advanced production capacity" and will return to growth in the future.
Cinda Securities believes that due to the consumption of customer resources after the “severe halt of speculation”, the continued loss of agents, and the sluggish consumer demand for residential insurance in the post-epidemic era, Ping An’s annual new policy premiums and NBV will continue to be accepted. Pressure. In the second half of the year, there is downward pressure on the economy on the investment side, and interest rates have downward expectations. However, the company's stock price has reflected the impairment losses of China Fortune and the pessimistic expectations of the insurance industry. It is recommended to pay attention.
Source: China Fund News
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