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Tuchong Creative/Photos provided by Xu Ying/Table creation by Zhou Jingyu/Chart creation

Securities Times reporter Xu Ying

Recently, a piece of news about a "securities brokerage agent switching careers to become a village secretary" has been all over the financial circle. Against the backdrop of the overall decline in securities investment banking business, the current situation of investment bankers has attracted attention.

Judging from the investment banking business data this year, the bond underwriting business has been growing steadily, becoming the ballast of investment banking business income, and the total scale of bond underwriting has increased slightly compared with the same period last year. However, the equity financing business is under pressure as a whole, and serving new quality productivity has become the focus of investment banks.

Insurance agent changes career to become village secretary

According to the WeChat public account of "Nanjing University Alumni Association", Nanjing University alumnus Gu Zifeng is a 2013 master's student in economics at Nanjing University. From July 2016 to July 2021, Gu Zifeng worked in the investment banking departments of Guohai Securities, Zhongtai Securities, and Zheshang Securities. He is a sponsor representative and has participated in many initial public offerings (IPOs), refinancing and major asset restructuring projects. Now, Gu Zifeng works for the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission of Shandong Province and serves as the first secretary of the provincial village in Juye County, Heze City.

The content of the official account also shows that in January 2024, Gu Zifeng responded to the call of the Shandong Provincial Party Committee for rural revitalization and took the initiative to apply for the work of the first secretary of the village. In the past six months, Gu Zifeng has formulated assistance plans in accordance with the requirements of the superiors on rural revitalization, "focusing on people's livelihood and industry at the same time", and combined research.

In fact, the transformation of insurance agents in investment banks in recent years is not an isolated case. A senior investment banker told reporters that the traditional paths for insurance agents to transform include equity investment in the primary market, professional secretary to the board of directors of companies to be listed, and investment and mergers and acquisitions positions in listed companies. "However, there have been new changes in the past two years. Equity investment in the primary market is relatively quiet, and the path of professional secretary to the board of directors has also been affected by the reduction of IPOs. Now more people will choose industry, which is in line with the direction guided by the country."

Since 2024, under the background of shrinking investment banking business of securities companies, the halo of insurance agents has gradually faded, but the number of insurance agents is still growing. At the end of 2022, the total number of insurance agents was 7,834, and as of July 18, 2024, the total number of insurance agents has reached 8,802. The reporter noticed that at present, many securities companies have optimized their investment banking teams for the purpose of reducing costs and increasing efficiency, and some investment banking personnel have been transferred internally to proprietary, wealth, fixed income, asset management and other business lines.

Service quality productivity becomes the focus

Since 2024, the overall equity financing business of securities companies has been under pressure. Wind data shows that according to the listing date, as of July 18, since 2024, a total of 223 securities companies have underwritten equity, with a total equity underwriting amount of 181.408 billion yuan (including initial public offerings, additional issuances, convertible bonds, exchangeable bonds, etc.), and a total of 3.014 billion yuan in underwriting and sponsorship fees, both of which have decreased significantly year-on-year.

Judging from the ranking of equity underwriting amount, securities firms with strong investment banking strength in the past still rank high. The top three are CITIC Securities (32.121 billion yuan), Huatai United Securities (21.492 billion yuan), and CICC (17.48 billion yuan). In addition, securities firms such as CITIC Construction Investment, Guosen Securities, China Merchants Securities, Guojin Securities, and Guotai Junan Securities also had underwriting scales exceeding 10 billion yuan this year.

A person from a leading securities investment bank told reporters that the pace of equity financing issuance has slowed significantly since the beginning of this year, and some larger-scale equity refinancing projects have not been accepted or have been suspended.

"Since the beginning of this year, the number of projects and underwriting amounts have dropped sharply, which has increased the temporary and contingent nature of short-term data and rankings. Short-term market rankings cannot fully reflect the comprehensive strength of investment banks. The formation of the competitive landscape of securities companies is the result of long-term accumulation. The advantages of leading securities companies in customer base, word-of-mouth reputation, and service capabilities will be difficult to shake in the short term." The above person said.

The reporter learned from the leading investment banks that at present, all investment banks are focusing on further correcting their business positioning and giving full play to their functionality. How to serve the new quality productivity and do a good job in the "five major articles" has become the baton for the high-quality development of investment banking business.

Bond underwriting business is growing steadily

Compared with equity financing, securities firms' bond underwriting business has been growing steadily, becoming the ballast of securities firms' investment banking business.

Wind data shows that as of July 18, the total bond underwriting scale of securities companies this year was 6.7909 trillion yuan, an increase of about 4.3% year-on-year; the total number of underwritten bonds was 19,159, an increase of about 9.5% year-on-year.

Among them, the total scale of local government bond underwriting by securities companies reached 1,580.8 billion yuan, the total scale of financial bond underwriting was 1,608.4 billion yuan, the total scale of corporate bond underwriting was 2,057.6 billion yuan, the scale of medium-term notes was 585.3 billion yuan, and the total scale of ABS (asset securitization) reached 733.6 billion yuan.

Judging from the ranking of securities firms' bond underwriting business, CITIC Securities and CITIC Construction Investment firmly occupy the first and second positions. The scale of bond underwriting has reached 973.347 billion yuan and 746.782 billion yuan respectively since the beginning of this year.

China International Capital Corporation and Guotai Junan Securities ranked third and fourth respectively, with bond underwriting scales of 563.051 billion yuan and 554.533 billion yuan respectively. Huatai Securities ranked fifth with a bond underwriting scale of 463.268 billion yuan.