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21st Century Business Herald reporter Chen Zhi reports from Shanghai

It caused a huge uproar.

On August 1, the "Guidelines for the Operation of Private Securities Investment Funds" (hereinafter referred to as the "New Regulations") will be officially implemented.

The new regulations require that private fund managers shall not provide fund net value and other performance-related information to institutions or individuals that do not have a private securities investment fund sales agency relationship. In addition, except for private fund managers and fund sales institutions that have signed a fund agency sales agreement with them, no institution or individual may display or transmit fund net value and other performance-related information.

At present, many private equity fund service platforms such as Private Equity Ranking Network have successively "removed" many non-agency private equity products' net value disclosure services.

"This has also made the private equity product agency business even worse," a third-party wealth management agency manager said to reporters. Since the beginning of this year, the increased volatility of the equity market has led to a significant decline in the willingness of high-net-worth investors to invest in securities private equity products. Now, they lack "performance comparisons" of different securities private equity products, and it is difficult for them to understand the actual investment advantages of private equity institutions, which has further cooled their investment interest.

Many high-net-worth investors told reporters that in the past, before deciding whether to subscribe to securities private equity products, they would comprehensively compare the cumulative returns, annualized returns, returns in the past year, maximum net value retracement, and net value retracement recovery time of private equity products with the same strategy from different private equity institutions to determine whether the private equity products they invested in had "strong investment strength." Today. As third-party wealth management institutions are unable to display this "product performance comparison" information, their private equity product investments have also lost their "sense of direction" to some extent.

"The net value of private securities products has fallen significantly since the beginning of this year, and we can take this opportunity to decline investment invitations from third-party wealth management institutions." A high-net-worth investor privately revealed to reporters.

This has made many small and medium-sized third-party wealth management institutions "feel very uneasy" - once they lose the revenue from the private equity product agency sales business, they will soon face "survival issues."

The head of the above-mentioned third-party wealth management institution said frankly that although the industry generally believes that the "New Regulations" may have a greater impact on small and medium-sized private equity institutions, in fact, the reshuffle effect of the "New Regulations" on the third-party wealth management industry cannot be ignored.

It is worth noting that in the face of private equity products being "increasingly difficult to sell", some large third-party wealth management institutions with public fund agency licenses have quickly changed their business strategies and started to "promote" public funds to high-net-worth investors in an effort to "retain" these high-net-worth clients.

The difficulty of selling private equity products has increased

Affected by the New Regulations, the number of private equity products whose net value fluctuations can be displayed on many private equity fund service platforms has shrunk significantly in recent days.

Currently, Private Equity Ranking Network displays the net value of more than 1,000 private equity products that have signed agency sales agreements.

However, according to data from the China Association of Securities Investment Funds, as of the end of June, the number of existing private equity securities investment funds reached 95,000, which means that the proportion of private equity products for which the Private Equity Ranking Network can show net value fluctuations is only about 1%.

In addition, many private equity fund service platforms have also significantly reduced the number of net value disclosures of products under a single private equity institution. For example, Oriental Harbor has 106 private equity products, but a private equity fund service platform can only display the net value fluctuations of three of them, and the products of many private equity institutions with a total value of tens of billions, such as Jinglin and Danshuiquan, cannot display the latest net value fluctuations.

"The reason behind this is that after the implementation of the new regulations, private equity fund service platforms can only display information related to the performance of private equity products they sell on behalf of others," the head of the aforementioned third-party wealth management institution told reporters. However, this also poses a great impact on the private equity product agency sales business of third-party wealth management institutions.

In the past, when they were selling private equity products on behalf of others, they would collect the performance and net value fluctuations of private equity products with the same strategy from different private equity institutions through platforms such as Private Equity Ranking Network for high-net-worth investors to "compare". This would highlight that the private equity institutions that entrusted them to sell the products have high investment strength, thereby attracting high-net-worth investors to "pay to subscribe".

Now, with the implementation of the New Regulations, they find it difficult to "match" the performance and net value fluctuations of private equity products with the same strategies of other private equity institutions, and are faced with the embarrassment of "a good cook cannot cook without rice".

"In late July, we also discussed internally to take some workarounds, such as purchasing performance data of other private equity institutions through certain channels, and presenting it to high-net-worth investors orally during product roadshows for the latter to compare performance," the head of a third-party wealth management institution told reporters. However, the compliance department soon raised objections - according to the requirements of the "New Regulations", except for private equity fund managers and fund sales institutions that have signed agency sales agreements with them, no institution or individual may display or transmit performance-related information such as fund net value.

This means that if high-net-worth investors "record" transactions on site and report them to financial regulators, they will face accountability for violating regulations.

He said helplessly that at present they can only watch private equity products "get harder and harder to sell" - since the beginning of this year, the volatility of equity markets has increased, causing high-net-worth investors to drop their willingness to invest in securities private equity products. Nowadays, many high-net-worth investors simply refuse their investment invitations on the grounds that "private equity products lack sufficient comparative performance data with peers."

Dr. Hu Bo, investment director of Shanghai Bofei Fund, said that the "disappearance" of the net value of a large number of private equity products may make high-net-worth investors lack "navigation" for private equity product investments. In the future, it is possible that high-net-worth investors will have a stronger sense of awe for private equity product investments because they cannot see the net value of the products - they are more inclined to invest in private equity institutions with greater reputations, which will have a greater impact on the development of small and medium-sized private equity institutions.

It is worth noting that some private equity institutions have also expressed their concerns.

Dan Bin, chairman of Oriental Harbor Investment, said that relevant departments should take new measures to require all private equity funds to disclose their holdings. Only when high-net-worth investors have a clear understanding of the listed companies invested in by private equity products can they effectively avoid risks. At the same time, the net value of private equity funds should also be "disclosed" so that the public can monitor the performance of private equity fund companies. Otherwise, if the fund company reappears after changing its name, it will be difficult for investors to understand its true situation.

Some third-party wealth management institutions have turned to "public offering product agency sales"

Faced with the fact that private equity products are "increasingly difficult to sell", large third-party wealth management institutions with public fund agency licenses have quickly changed their business strategies and "guided" high-net-worth investors to increase their public fund investments.

"Originally, high-net-worth investors were relatively keen on investing in private equity funds. The main reason was that they valued the absolute returns that private equity funds pursue (the higher the returns, the better). On the contrary, they were not very interested in investing in public equity fund products that pursue relative returns (outperforming the industry average)." The head of the aforementioned third-party wealth management agency told reporters.

This situation has changed significantly since the beginning of this year. The reasons are that, firstly, the actual investment return rate of some public funds is not lower than that of private funds, and secondly, the liquidity of public funds is better than that of private funds.

"In the absence of a comparison of private fund product performance, some high-net-worth investors who intend to buy the bottom of A-shares have also turned their investment focus to public funds, because the net value disclosure frequency and transparency of securities public funds are relatively higher, which helps them find the most investment-worthy products for bottom-fishing investment through multi-dimensional comparison." The head of a third-party wealth management institution said frankly. At present, they are strengthening their investment research on public funds, striving to select a group of securities public funds with relatively stable performance and relatively low product net value volatility for high-net-worth investors.

In addition, he also found that some large third-party wealth management institutions are trying to provide "companion services" - that is, they will "watch the market" for high-net-worth investors. Once the net value of public fund products shows an abnormal decline or the investment style changes suddenly, they will remind high-net-worth investors to pay attention to the relevant investment risks in a timely manner.

However, small and medium-sized third-party wealth management institutions that lack public fund agency licenses may face a new "darkest hour."

An operations director of a small or medium-sized third-party wealth management institution told reporters that the revenue from the agency sales of private equity products accounts for more than 50%. Once the net value of a large number of private equity products "disappears" and private equity products become increasingly difficult to sell, they may soon face survival pressure.

In his opinion, the new regulations may accelerate the reshuffle of the third-party wealth management industry.

Reporters learned that private banks and trust companies that serve a large number of high-net-worth investors appear to be quite calm in the face of the implementation of the new regulations.

A private banker told the reporter that currently his private bank only sells sunshine private equity products of more than 10 private equity institutions that meet the requirements (within the private bank's white list). Since high-net-worth investors in private banks have subscribed to a number of sunshine private equity products of these private equity institutions and are relatively familiar with the latter's investment philosophy, investment strategies, product net value fluctuation stability and overall investment returns, high-net-worth private bank clients do not need to make complex product performance comparisons and will continue to subscribe to newly issued private equity products.

"At the same time, we will continue to track the investment styles and product performance stability of these private equity institutions. Once we find that they have abnormal investment style drift and product net value changes, we will quickly remove them from the whitelist." He told reporters. This also imposes a lot of hard constraints on private equity institutions, forcing them to always pay attention to the execution effect of their investment strategies and ensure that high-net-worth investors buy private equity products that "practice what they preach."

A director of the wealth management department of a trust company revealed to reporters that they are currently mainly selling the sunshine private equity products of several leading private equity institutions in the industry, so as to obtain product performance information of these leading private equity institutions in the industry.

"At present, the product performance information of these industry-leading private equity institutions is sufficient for high-price investors to complete product performance comparisons, which is the main basis for them to choose private equity products." He told reporters. At present, the biggest challenge facing trust companies in selling sunshine private equity products is that high-net-worth investors of trust companies prefer fixed-income products. With the sharp decline in the net value of quantitative private equity products at the beginning of the year, the belief in "low risk and high return" has been broken. At present, their promotion of quantitative strategy sunshine private equity products is being coldly received by more and more high-net-worth investors.