750 billion Hu'an Fund swallows 250 billion Hai Fu Tong Fund, is it settled? The management team will face a reshuffle.

Hu’an Fund and Haitong Fund’s “century merger” has finally entered the final countdown stage. As exclusively learned from 21st Century Business Herald, after Guotai Junan and Haitong Securities merged to form “Guotai Haitong Securities,” to address the regulatory challenge of “one participant, one controller,” the integration plan for the two public fund subsidiaries under their umbrella has been finalized: Hu’an Fund will take the lead to absorb and merge Haitong Fund.

The final plan is expected to be officially announced by the end of March or the beginning of April. This highly watched industry reshuffle will not only reshape the public fund landscape, but will also be accompanied by a major personnel earthquake within Hu’an Fund.

01

The suspense is unveiled: Hu’an Fund absorbs Haitong

The direction of this merger was once full of suspense. Although Haitong Fund is far smaller than Hu’an—by July 2025, Hu’an Fund’s assets under management will be 750 billion yuan, about three times Haitong’s—Haitong Fund holds valuable management qualifications for pension funds, corporate annuities, and social security funds.

Against the backdrop that Hu’an Fund lacks these key qualifications, industry speculation once asked whether a “snake swallowing an elephant” scenario would occur, with Haitong taking the lead to preserve its license advantage.

21st Century Business Herald reported that insiders said that earlier this year, the decision-makers had already made it clear that Hu’an Fund would lead. As one of the “Old Ten” public fund companies established in 1998, Hu’an has an absolute advantage in product layout, investment research strength, and brand accumulation.

Although Haitong Fund’s pension license is highly valuable and new issuances have long been suspended, in the new entity formed after the merger, how to resolve the licensing issue by inheriting or applying for internal qualifications will be the key to subsequent operations. This “strong-strong alliance” is, in effect, a strong absorbing the weak—aimed at building a leading public fund powerhouse that combines both scale and qualifications.

02

Personnel shadow lines surface: management faces a major reshuffle

With the merger plan taking shape, Hu’an Fund’s executive leadership team is undergoing a profound restructuring of the “Yangtze River Pension system.”

The former Yangtze River Pension general manager assistant, Yan Tao, has taken up the role and is set to serve as vice general manager of Hu’an Fund. This appointment forms a perfect “reunion of old colleagues” with Xu Yong, who became chairman of Hu’an Fund in August 2025. Both Xu Yong and Yan Tao had worked for many years at Yangtze River Pension, and Xu Yong had even served as the company’s general manager.

Yan Tao has more than 20 years of experience in the financial industry, with deep credentials in pension operations and alternative investments. His arrival will inevitably trigger significant adjustments to the current division of responsibilities within Hu’an Fund’s management.

At present, among Hu’an Fund’s existing three vice general managers, Gu Yuanyuan, who is in charge of retail, left the company in 2025; her responsibilities are temporarily handled by Yao Guoping, who oversees institutional business. After Yan Tao joins, it is highly likely that he will take over phone-to-broker business, thereby forming new checks and balances and collaboration with Yao Guoping.

Hu’an Fund’s current general manager, Zhang Xiaoling, is expected to retire after reaching the retirement age by the end of this month or early next month. This “sea-returned” executive with backgrounds in the Federal Reserve and the China Banking and Insurance Regulatory Commission has witnessed Hu’an’s ups and downs since taking the helm in 2020. His departure marks the end of an era for Hu’an Fund.

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