Public offerings will face a "100-day performance review," with the performance gap between the top and bottom funds exceeding 92 percentage points

Data source: Wind Wang Minghong / Compiled by

Securities Times reporter: Wu Qi

With the 2026 market outlook set to approach the 100-day milestone, performance among public mutual funds is accelerating in its divergence. Data show that, as of April 3, the gap between the first and last returns across all funds in the market since the start of the year has already exceeded 92 percentage points. Among them, funds focused on the optical communications theme have been strong, continuing to lead; while funds heavily invested in directions such as Hong Kong internet stocks and humanoid robots have been relatively weak and are currently trailing in the rankings. Across different tracks, there is a clear contrast of “ice and fire in two extremes.”

Funds heavily invested in optical communications see stronger performance

Recently, the A-share market has been volatile overall, but the optical communications sector has risen against the trend, becoming a key driving force behind net asset value increases for related funds. Benefiting from the sector’s strong performance, multiple funds heavily allocated to optical communications have seen their performance improve in a concentrated manner, with product net asset values frequently hitting new highs.

Judging from fund performance, active equity products such as Guoshou Anbao Digital Economy, Jinxin Quantitative Selection, Guoshou Anbao Strategy Selection, and Huatai-PineBridge Quality Growth—each among the leaders in industry gains since the start of the year—have all maintained relatively high allocations to the optical communications sector. As of April 3, the year-to-date returns of these funds have all exceeded 30%.

On the trading board, optical communications sub-sectors such as OCS (optical circuit switching), CPO (co-packaged optics), and optical fiber have seen heat gathering. On April 3, Deko Li surged to a 20% daily limit-up; Tengjing Technology jumped 19.22%; and major names such as Guangju Technology and Guangxun Technology also rose in tandem. In addition, within the CPO concept, Robotek and Yuanjie Technology also moved higher together. Moreover, shares of optical fiber concept stocks such as Feitian Optical Fiber repeatedly hit historical record highs, highlighting the strong momentum of the sector.

Behind the secondary-market performance are dual drivers: high industry enthusiasm and policy support. As global AI computing power infrastructure construction accelerates, demand for optical modules, optical fiber and optical cables has remained strong. Upstream raw material prices have risen rapidly. In March 2026, the spot price of domestic G652.D bare optical fiber increased by 165% from January, and rose 418% year over year, providing strong cost support. In terms of policy, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology recently issued a notice on the inclusive computing power special action, specifying support for deploying technologies such as OCS to reduce network latency, bringing direct benefits to optical communications and other infrastructure.

Many institutions believe that, from a medium- to long-term perspective, the growth momentum of the communications equipment industry chain remains firm. With the current AI computing power demand upsurge still in its early stage, the ongoing global wave of large data center construction will continue to support an upward trend in the prosperity of upstream core components such as optical fibers and optical modules.

Fund performance gaps exceed 92 percentage points

At the start of the second quarter of 2026, the market continued to fluctuate and differences in public fund performance further intensified. Driven by factors including recent geopolitical developments in the Middle East, crude oil prices led among commodities, boosting the strong performance of related theme funds. Data show that, as of April 3, multiple crude oil-themed QDII funds have already significantly outperformed year-to-date. The year-to-date returns of Southern Crude Oil, E Fund Crude Oil, and CSIAM Crude Oil are 64.91%, 59.71%, and 58.08%, respectively.

In contrast, ShanZheng Asset Management Digital Economy Select A saw a year-to-date loss of 27.57%, and the end-to-end gap in year-to-date returns across all funds has already exceeded 92 percentage points.

By comparison, the A-share market has been relatively volatile over the same period. As of April 3, the Shanghai Composite Index has fallen by 2.24% year-to-date, the CSI 300 Index has fallen by 4.09% year-to-date, and the ChiNext Index has fallen by 1.67% year-to-date. Against the backdrop of heightened overall market volatility, oil-and-gas funds—bearing both commodity attributes and an overseas asset allocation attribute—have become one of the few directions that performed notably this year.

Guangfa Vision Select Fund has delivered outstanding performance since the start of the year, with a gain of 60.29%. Among active equity funds, multiple funds—including Guoshou Anbao Digital Economy, Jinxin Quantitative Selection, Pingyin Ansheng Digital Economy, Guoshou Anbao Strategy Selection, Huashang Zhiyuan Return, Huatai-PineBridge Quality Growth, and Ping An Technology Select—have also achieved gains exceeding 30%. Judging from the overall distribution of performance, sector funds represented by “optical/光” themes, along with crude oil theme funds, have jointly led the market.

However, in the backdrop of overall A-share market volatility, more than half of active equity funds still have negative returns over the year. Wind data show that, as of April 3, the return of the stock-focused hybrid fund index was only 0.24%, reflecting that active equity products have shown significant performance divergence overall and an uneven return structure.

From the performance of individual funds, the divergence is even more pronounced. Among them, the fund with the largest decline in net asset value has already exceeded 27%, and there are 38 active equity funds across the market whose year-to-date decline exceeds 20%. In terms of structure, the products with leading drawdowns are mostly concentrated in specific themes or tracks such as Hong Kong stock internet, humanoid robots, and aviation.

Fund managers are bullish on the computing power infrastructure main line

Although the equity market has been volatile recently, many fund managers still see opportunities in specific areas and firmly believe that what determines the stock pricing center of gravity remains the companies’ profitability itself.

Agricultural Bingli, fund manager of the Jingshun Changcheng Stock Investment Department, said that overseas geopolitical conflicts have temporarily increased market volatility and also created some disturbance to risk appetite. He believes that in the short term, such factors affect market pacing and valuation fluctuations more; but in the medium to long term, what determines the stock pricing center of gravity still comes down to companies’ profitability itself. In the AI industry, around hardware optimization and technology upgrades at the reasoning stage, this is expected to become an important main line for AI infrastructure in the next phase. He continues to be optimistic about the performance realization capability and growth space in areas such as optical interconnect and heterogeneous computing.

Liu Jiang, fund manager at Great Wall Fund, pointed out that the AI industry is still in the early-to-mid development stage and is an important direction with long-term growth potential. In terms of investment positioning, he has not broadly chased “AI concepts,” but instead focuses on segments in the industrial chain with higher certainty, that benefit earlier, and that have clear competitive barriers—AI’s “shovel sellers,” namely the computing power infrastructure sector. Liu Jiang believes that, as the core foundation for AI development, computing power will continue to receive demand support brought by industrial expansion, and has strong potential for performance realization.

Among the sub-directions in the computing power chain, Liu Jiang focuses on the optical communications sector. His view is not only that computing power demand is growing, but more importantly that optical communications technology itself is undergoing important changes. He noted that, from the underlying industrial logic, optical communications, as a key link in the AI computing power chain, is trending toward an upward direction in long-term penetration rates. Overseas technology giants promoting the development of emerging technologies such as OCS and CPO also fully demonstrates the importance of optical interconnect, driving the continuous increase in optical interconnect’s value scale.

Chen Jinwei, fund manager at Penghua Fund, who dares to take a contrarian stance, is most bullish on midstream cyclical industries (represented by chemicals) and consumption-related healthcare with an internal-demand attribute. In particular, benefiting from the “anti-overcrowding” effect in midstream cycles, he began significantly increasing his holdings in midstream industries represented by chemicals starting from the early third quarter of 2025. He believes that there is still a significant expectation gap in the market about it—especially the long-term value of the chemical industry, which has not yet been fully recognized. Consumption and healthcare are among the worst-performing sectors over the past five years, but since 2025, Chen Jinwei has been looking at structural opportunities driven by domestic demand and believes this may be the sector with the largest space and the biggest expectation gap in the next five years. Although current market sentiment is generally cautious toward the consumption sector and even includes a certain degree of irrational pessimism, the turning point may be right ahead.

(Editor: Dong Pingping )

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