Despite unveiling a robust set of half-year financial results, Guotai Haitong Securities Co., Ltd. (601211) has also brought a significant regulatory penalty to the forefront within its latest earnings report.

The report discloses that in August 2026, the company was ordered to rectify issues related to errors in its balance of payments statistical reporting. The Shanghai branch of the State Administration of Foreign Exchange (SAFE) issued a warning and imposed a fine of RMB 150,000 on the firm.

More notably, during its business operations from 2019 to 2022, Guotai Haitong Asset Management was found to have individual products violating regulations concerning foreign exchange administration for qualified domestic institutional investors' overseas securities investments. Consequently, the SAFE Shanghai branch mandated corrective actions, issued a warning, and levied a fine of RMB 25.874 million. Additionally, the regulator confiscated illegal gains amounting to RMB 26.6734 million and imposed a separate fine of RMB 70,000 on the directly responsible personnel.

In response, Guotai Haitong stated that it has fully completed remedial measures for the aforementioned issues. The company also affirmed that these penalties would have no impact on its current normal business operations or that of its asset management arm.

Investigations by the SAFE Shanghai branch revealed that these violations were uncovered during an on-site inspection of the former Guotai Junan Securities. The specific infractions for Guotai Haitong included failure to conduct direct reporting for balance of payments statistics as required, as well as breaches of foreign exchange account regulations. Meanwhile, the asset management company's violations pertained to non-compliance with the foreign exchange administration rules for qualified domestic institutional investors and failure to perform indirect reporting for balance of payments statistics.

Notably, according to the latest QDII investment quota approval list published by SAFE, Shanghai Guotai Haitong Securities Asset Management Co., Ltd. has received cumulative QDII investment quotas reaching USD 2.33 billion, representing a considerable scale of cross-border investment resources among securities and fund institutions.

For the first half of this year, Guotai Haitong achieved operating revenue of RMB 47.163 billion, a year-on-year increase of 97.56%. Its non-GAAP net profit attributable to shareholders reached RMB 19.51 billion, surging 168.02% year-on-year, while the net profit attributable to shareholders stood at RMB 20.26 billion, up 28.74% from the previous year. These figures mark record highs for the period and surpass the combined peak performance of the former Guotai Junan and Haitong Securities.

Concurrently, Guotai Haitong continues its generous dividend policy. For the 2026 interim period, the company plans to distribute RMB 3 (tax inclusive) per 10 shares, doubling the distribution from the same period last year. The proposed total cash dividend is RMB 5.254 billion (tax inclusive), representing 25.93% of its net profit attributable to shareholders.