Renowned Fund Manager Resigns! Active Equity AUM Share Declines, East China Securities Asset Management Losing Its Edge

(Source: Meicai.com)

Dongzheng Asset Management’s well-known fund manager Ding Rui has resigned, after managing assets that grew by 20 billion yuan last year.

Text / Daily Financial Report Chu Feng

Once again, a prominent fund manager has left. Recently, Shanghai Dongzheng Securities Asset Management Co., Ltd. (hereinafter “Dongzheng Asset”) announced that fund manager Ding Rui has resigned due to personal reasons. He will no longer hold any other positions within the company, and has completed deregistration procedures with the China Asset Management Association as required.

Ding Rui served as a fund manager at Dongzheng Asset for over 7 years, managing assets totaling more than 68 billion yuan, and is well-known in the fixed income investment field. After his departure, several of his managed products have been handed over to Li Yan, Chen Xuanxuan, Xu Mi, and others. Among them, Chen Xuanxuan has been a fund manager for less than 2 years.

Daily Financial Report notes that by 2025, Dongzheng Asset’s management scale will recover to over 200 billion yuan, mainly driven by fixed income products. Ding Rui’s management growth alone exceeded 20 billion yuan, significantly boosting the company’s overall scale. His departure is undoubtedly a major loss for Dongzheng Asset.

Additionally, the scale of Dongzheng Asset’s active equity funds has increased but still has not reached the trillion-yuan mark. Among public fund management companies, Dongzheng Asset was once distinctive, leading in active equity fund scale. However, with changes in the capital markets and the company’s failure to generate good returns for investors, its active equity funds are losing their advantage.

Well-known manager Ding Rui has left,

Last year, managed assets grew by 20 billion

Public information shows that Ding Rui began managing funds in November 2018, initially focusing on money market funds. In 2020, he was appointed as a bond fund manager. At the time of his departure, Ding Rui’s managed assets totaled 68.454 billion yuan, accounting for 31.44% of Dongzheng Asset’s total scale. Of this, the money market fund managed by Ding Rui was 43.024 billion yuan.

Daily Financial Report observes that by 2025, the fixed income fund scale at Dongzheng Asset grew rapidly, with Ding Rui’s products being a major driver. During this period, the company’s bond fund scale reached 62.512 billion yuan, an increase of 18.905 billion yuan from the end of 2024; money market funds totaled 43.023 billion yuan, up 16.615 billion yuan from the end of 2024.

Compared to the end of 2024, Ding Rui’s management scale increased by 22.678 billion yuan. Excluding money market funds, the bond funds managed by Ding Rui also grew by over 6 billion yuan.

In terms of performance, according to Tonghuashun iFinD data, Ding Rui’s representative work is the Dongfanghong Xin Tai 66-month fixed-open bond fund, with a nearly 6-year return of 21.91%, an annualized return of 3.60%, and an annualized volatility of only 0.1122%. Among long-term fixed-open bond funds, this performance is relatively outstanding.

After Ding Rui’s departure, the 7 products he managed have been assigned to three fund managers: Li Yan, Chen Xuanxuan, and Xu Mi. Li Yan has been in the role for over 8 years, longer than Ding Rui’s tenure, and they previously co-managed money market funds. Now, Li Yan and Chen Xuanxuan jointly manage money market funds. Additionally, Ding Rui and Li Yan also co-managed the Dongfanghong short-term bond fund, which is now managed solely by Li Yan.

Dongfanghong 30-day rolling pure bond holdings are managed independently by Xu Mi. Xu Mi has over 9 years of experience, managing 4.432 billion yuan, and is a veteran at Dongzheng Asset. The Dongfanghong Xin An 39-month fixed-open bond fund and another similar fund are managed solely by Chen Xuanxuan.

It is worth noting that Chen Xuanxuan is a rookie fund manager, with only 1 year and 191 days of experience. Excluding the money market fund co-managed with Li Yan, her bond management scale has reached 16.201 billion yuan, even surpassing the veteran Xu Mi.

Active equity scale sluggish,

Long-term investment questioned

In the public fund market, Dongzheng Asset was once a distinctive player, not only leading in management scale among securities asset management firms but also characterized by a dominant share of active equity funds, attracting continuous investor attention.

By the end of 2021, Dongzheng Asset’s management scale reached 269.723 billion yuan, with hybrid funds accounting for 200.228 billion yuan, and active equity funds making up over 80%.

At that time, the A-share market experienced a structural bull run, and Dongzheng Asset’s active equity funds were favored by many investors. The company seized this opportunity to continuously launch new funds, many with a 3-year holding period. Data shows that at the end of 2020, Dongzheng Asset managed 40 hybrid funds, increasing to 59 by the end of 2021.

3-year holding period products, enforced for medium- to long-term holding, were once considered a model of value investing. However, these funds were established at market highs, and as the market corrected, funds held at high levels suffered losses, damaging investor confidence and trust in the manager.

Starting in 2022, the A-share market experienced phased adjustments, with major indices fluctuating downward, and Dongzheng Asset’s active equity scale continued to decline. In the first quarter of 2022 alone, its hybrid fund scale shrank by 31.657 billion yuan. By mid-2024, its hybrid fund scale officially fell below 1 trillion yuan.

By the end of 2025, Dongzheng Asset’s hybrid fund scale was 881.40 billion yuan, up 8.021 billion yuan from the end of 2024. Even if the A-share market strengthened in 2025, Dongzheng Asset would find it difficult to replicate its 2021 peak.

Daily Financial Report notes that in 2025, ETF funds became popular in the public market, with the ETF market scale expanding significantly. However, Dongzheng Asset did not deploy ETF funds and continued to focus on active equity products. By the end of 2025, the company managed 80 hybrid funds, but this did not significantly boost its overall scale.

Meanwhile, the passive equity fund scale at Dongzheng Asset also increased. By the end of 2025, its stock product scale was 12.815 billion yuan, with passive equity funds accounting for 10.057 billion yuan, an increase of about 4.2 billion yuan from the end of 2024.

This indicates that Dongzheng Asset is losing its core feature of primarily managing active equity funds. Currently, fixed income funds are the main driver of the company’s scale, while active equity fund growth has slowed considerably, and their proportion has decreased sharply.

In the past two years, the A-share market has been steadily recovering, with the Shanghai Composite Index surpassing 4,000 points, but Dongzheng Asset still has several active equity funds at a loss, mainly 3-year holding funds.

According to Daily Financial Report, as of March 9, Dongzheng Asset manages 11 active equity funds with losses since inception, 8 of which were established in 2021, most being 3-year holding funds.

The most significant losses are from Dongfanghong Qixing three-year hybrid, Dongfanghong Qirui three-year hybrid, and Dongfanghong Xinyuan three-year hybrid, with losses of 31.66%, 20.21%, and 18.67%, respectively.

Moreover, the overall performance of Dongzheng Asset’s equity-oriented products is below industry peers. According to Tonghuashun iFinD data, over the past five years, their equity product index performance was -0.62%, better than the CSI 300’s -7.76%, but significantly below similar companies’ 17.61%. This performance ranks 101st out of 139 in its peer group.

In summary, Ding Rui’s departure is yet another example of talent loss for the company. His managed assets continued to grow, reflecting that Dongzheng Asset is maintaining scale through fixed income products, while the proportion of active equity funds—once a company hallmark—has significantly decreased.