Morning News

Source: Wall Street News

## Market Overview

Major European and American markets were generally closed for Christmas. The Japanese Yen rebounded for four consecutive days, with a cumulative gain exceeding 1% over the period. Cryptocurrencies also rallied, with Bitcoin surging more than 1% from its daily low at one point and reclaiming the $88,000 mark.

Shanghai Silver’s night session jumped over 5%, breaking the 18,000-yuan threshold to hit a record high.

During the Asian trading session, the Shanghai Composite Index notched a seventh straight day of gains. Non-ferrous metals corrected, while commercial aerospace and robotics stocks soared by the 10% daily limit. Offshore Renminbi broke through the 7.0 level intraday for the first time in nearly 15 months, rising over 100 pips at one stage.

---

## Key News

### Ministry of Commerce of the People’s Republic of China Responses

1. On potential relaxation of rare earth magnet export restrictions to the US: We actively promote and facilitate compliant trade.

2. On TikTok’s plan to establish a joint venture in the US: We hope the enterprise can reach a solution that complies with Chinese laws and regulations and balances interests.

3. Strongly opposes the US imposing Section 301 tariffs on Chinese semiconductor products and has lodged solemn representations.

The Ministry of Commerce will make every effort to boost consumption and ensure market supply at the year-end and beginning of the new year, and further implement special consumption promotion initiatives.

After three consecutive daily limit-ups, SDIC Silver LOF plunged by the daily limit on the 25th. As arbitrage risks emerged, the fund took action: the monthly fixed-investment cap for Class A shares was lowered back to 100 yuan, effective from the 29th.

Japan’s fiscal stimulus continues to accelerate. The government plans to unveil a record 122 trillion yen budget for the new fiscal year, a 6.3% increase from the current fiscal year.

Zelensky stated that his talks with Trump’s envoys and son-in-law went “very well,” focusing on accelerating the timeline for achieving “genuine peace.”

Tianqi Lithium has restructured its lithium carbonate pricing system, shifting spot settlement references to anchor on “Mysteel + futures.”

Did leading wafer manufacturers sharply raise quotes on the 25th? Industry insiders: Driven by rising upstream polysilicon prices.

Xiaomi launched its flagship imaging smartphone 17 Ultra, starting at 6,999 yuan—500 yuan higher than the previous generation.

---

## Detailed News

### Global Highlights

#### China’s Ministry of Commerce Initiatives

The Ministry will drive consumption via a dual engine of “policies + campaigns,” innovate to create diversified consumption scenarios, expand the supply of quality goods and services to better meet urban and rural residents’ holiday consumption demands. It encourages key supermarkets and shopping malls to appropriately extend business hours, launch creative themed activities, enrich on-site arrangements, and enhance the holiday atmosphere. E-commerce platforms and logistics enterprises are supported to arrange transportation capacity rationally and ensure holiday delivery services.

#### Renminbi’s Year-End Rally Accelerates

Offshore Renminbi once broke through the 7.0 mark, and onshore Renminbi surpassed 7.01, both hitting new highs since late September last year. The market now holds a consensus expectation for Renminbi appreciation in 2026, with major foreign and domestic institutions generally optimistic about its performance next year, differing only in the magnitude and pace of gains.

Is the Renminbi’s appreciation just the start? Industrial Securities argues that the recent rally is not solely driven by US dollar movements. Insiders noted that after the relaxation of purchase restrictions on Class A shares on November 22, arbitrage funds subscribed aggressively, converting to on-exchange shares on a T+2 basis and rushing to cash out. Such arbitrage activities are likely to reduce high premiums and lead to a correction in on-exchange prices. Despite the fund’s substantial gains over the past month, investment risks remain significant.

#### SDIC Silver LOF Further Adjustments

The fixed-investment cap for Class A shares of SDIC UBS Silver Futures (LOF) was lowered back to 100 yuan, effective December 29. The fund has adjusted investment limits multiple times in just two months: from 6,000 yuan to 100 yuan on October 20, raised to 500 yuan on December 19, and now cut back to 100 yuan. The fund also announced a trading suspension from the opening on the 26th until 10:30, resuming thereafter, and warned of significant premium risks in secondary market trading prices.

#### Japan’s Record Budget Plan

Japan’s budget growth far outpaces inflation, mainly driven by rising social security spending due to aging and increased defense expenditure. To fund this, the government plans to issue approximately 29.6 trillion yen in new government bonds, with the debt dependency ratio expected to drop to 24.2%.

#### Tianqi Lithium’s Pricing System Overhaul

Tianqi Lithium’s Sales Center issued a notice stating that starting January 1, 2026, spot transaction settlement prices for all products will no longer reference SMM (Shanghai Metals Market) prices. Instead, they will be based on Mysteel’s premium battery-grade lithium carbonate and battery-grade lithium hydroxide (coarse particle) prices, or the main lithium carbonate contract price on the Guangzhou Futures Exchange, with customers given the option to choose.

#### Wafer Price Hikes Confirmed

Market reports indicated that on the afternoon of the 25th, four leading wafer manufacturers collectively raised quotes sharply: 183N wafers at 1.4 yuan per piece, 210RN at 1.5 yuan per piece, and 210N at 1.7 yuan per piece, representing an average increase of 12%. The Securities Times confirmed the price hikes with insiders from multiple wafer manufacturers.

#### NVIDIA’s Response to Google TPU Competition

Feeling pressured by Google’s TPU, NVIDIA’s Huang Renxun is sparing no expense to “acquire” Groq through technical licensing and absorbing its core team. This move is essentially NVIDIA’s direct response to the rise of Google’s TPU. As AI competition shifts from training to inference, GPU’s long-standing dominant advantage has begun to waver. TPU’s strengths in efficiency and cost structure are gradually emerging, promising to become a key moat for Google Cloud over the next decade. Against this backdrop, Huang Renxun has shown signs of anxiety for the first time.

#### NVIDIA’s Aggressive AI Industry Investment Spree

NVIDIA is using massive capital to “buy up” the entire AI industry chain: a $20 billion deal to acquire Groq, its top chip rival; a $5 billion investment in Intel, a former arch-enemy, to turn foes into allies; and a $1 billion bet on Nokia to expand into communication networks. The core goal of these strategic investments is to convert its cash advantage into systematic control over technology, talent, and the ecosystem, building an insurmountable moat.

What’s NVIDIA’s motivation behind the $20 billion Groq deal? It aims to eliminate potential threats in the high-efficiency, low-cost AI inference chip sector and directly absorb top-tier talent to address its own technical shortcomings. This is not only a defensive acquisition against competitors but also a crucial strategic move to widen its moat and consolidate its absolute market leadership using abundant cash reserves.

#### Game AI Breakthrough: NVIDIA’s New Model Masters 1,000+ Games via Live Streams

NVIDIA released the NitroGen game AI model, which learned to operate games by watching 40,000 hours of live streams—no backend data access required, relying solely on video footage to master over 1,000 games. Notably, this technology is built on the GR00T robot model, using games as a training ground. The AI that can solve puzzles in *The Legend of Zelda* and play *Black Myth: Wukong* today may control household robots tomorrow.

#### Xiaomi 17 Ultra Launch

Xiaomi unveiled its flagship imaging phone 17 Ultra, starting at 6,999 yuan—500 yuan more expensive than its predecessor. Highlighting a 1-inch main camera, Leica and LOFIC high dynamic range capabilities, it balances fireworks photography with an 8.29mm slim design. Equipped with the Snapdragon 8 Ultimate Edition, a 6,800mAh battery, and fast charging, the new model starts with 512GB storage, features seamless iPhone connectivity, and targets premium users and dual-phone owners.

# Alpha Summit

Zhu Yie from Kingsoft Office: From "Seeing" to "Mastering": AI Applications Enter the Era of "Knowledge - Enhanced Generation". Zhu Yie pointed out that the core bottleneck of current AI applications no longer lies in the models themselves, but in how to transform the massive, unstructured private - domain data within enterprises into high - quality knowledge that can be understood by AI. Traditional Retrieval - Augmented Generation (RAG) is constrained by the facts that "documents are not equivalent to knowledge" and "semantic similarity does not mean logical relevance". To address this, it is necessary to shift AI applications from a "model - centered" approach to a "data/knowledge - centered" one, and develop "Knowledge - Enhanced Generation (KAG)". Driven by both data lakes and knowledge lakes, enterprises should govern, model, and utilize knowledge assets, enabling AI to truly "master" rather than merely "see" corporate knowledge. In this way, reliable efficiency improvements can be achieved in scenarios such as professional Q&A and intelligent writing.

## Selected Research Reports

For 2026, these are the 10 key questions that top tech traders at Goldman Sachs are most concerned about. Callahan, a trader at Goldman Sachs, stated that the focus of tech stocks in 2026 will shift from hardware hype to AI return on investment and market breadth. Although the "Magnificent Seven" will still make significant contributions, their growth rate will slow down and the divergence among them will intensify. He listed ten crucial questions, covering the sustainability of AI spending, the recovery of software valuations, Apple's positioning, the large - language model (LLM) landscape, and cyclical inflection points.

Marko Papic's 10,000 - character Interview: Venezuela Cannot Save Oil Prices; Trump May "Pressure" the Federal Reserve in 2026, and the Stock Market Will Usher in a "YOLO Moment". Marko Papic opined that Trump's "no - fly zone" over Venezuela is actually a prelude to negotiations, aimed at addressing the energy crisis after Saudi Arabia stopped cooperating with the low - oil - price policy. As fiscal tools are exhausted, Trump will influence the Federal Reserve to implement monetary easing in 2026 to safeguard the midterm elections. While this poses a challenge to the Fed's independence, it may trigger irrational prosperity in the stock market.

## Domestic Macroeconomy

China Sets a World Record in Superconducting Electrodynamic Maglev Propulsion.

The People's Bank of China's Q4 regular meeting did not explicitly mention the "flexible and efficient use of reserve requirement ratio (RRR) cuts and interest rate reductions". What easing signals did it send? China Galaxy Macro Economics holds that the easing path in Q1 will involve RRR cuts and structural interest rate reductions, and a comprehensive interest rate cut still awaits the right time. Stabilizing expectations (externally), stabilizing employment (internally), and stabilizing the market (financially) will be the main factors to monitor for the potential implementation of a comprehensive interest rate cut. It is predicted that there will be 1 - 2 interest rate cuts throughout the year, with a total reduction of 10 - 20 basis points (BP) in policy rates. This will guide the Loan Prime Rate (LPR) downward and further drive down lending and deposit rates.

The Shanghai Composite Index has recorded seven consecutive days of gains. Has the A - share year - end and spring rally started? West China Securities believes that the conditions for the A - share year - end and spring rally have been met: reasonable valuations (the price - to - earnings ratio of CSI 300 is 14 times, at the 76th percentile of its historical range), loose liquidity (moderately loose monetary policy), and clear policy catalysts (expectations of fiscal expansion at the start of the 15th Five - Year Plan in 2026). A review by Guosen Securities found that the probability of a rising market is the highest from the Spring Festival to the Two Sessions, and sectors such as non - ferrous metals, computers, and electronics offer favorable risk - reward ratios.

A wave of maturing deposits is approaching. What impact will it have on the market? Huatai Fixed Income estimates that the volume of time deposits with a term of more than one year maturing next year will be approximately 50 trillion yuan, concentrated in the 2 - 5 - year tenors. State - owned major banks are likely to account for a larger share, with a scale of over 30 trillion yuan. The most direct impact will be a mitigation of the pressure on banks' net interest margins. Additionally, the stock market and short - duration credit are expected to benefit more steadily. The transfer of deposits may cause phased disruptions to liquidity, and certificate of deposit (CD) rates may fluctuate first and then decline. Conversely, banks will face greater pressure on indicators when allocating ultra - long - term government bonds.

## Domestic Companies

Speed is Everything! Major Global Automakers Are "Learning from China". To cope with fierce market competition, Western automotive giants such as Ford and Renault are actively emulating the "Chinese model", shortening the new car development cycle from over four years to around two years. The core of this "efficiency revolution" is cultural transformation: learning from Chinese enterprises' flexible supply chain management, flat decision - making processes, and concurrent engineering. Accelerating the development cycle can significantly reduce engineering costs and enable faster responses to technological and market changes, which executives regard as crucial for survival.

Magic Square Quantitative's "IPO Subscription Strategy" Comes to Light. Size Does Not Necessarily Determine Everything. Winning an allotment through a single account is indeed accidental, but when a sufficient number of accounts participate, the outcome will change.

Shanghai Microelectronics Wins a 110 - Million - Yuan Lithography Machine Project. Shanghai Microelectronics Equipment (Group) Co., Ltd. won the bid for the zycgr22011903 procurement project of a step - and - scan lithography machine, with one piece of equipment and a transaction amount of 110 million yuan. Zhangjiang Hi - Tech's stock price soared sharply.

The First Unprofitable IPO on ChiNext Arrives! On December 25, Shenzhen Dapu Microelectronics, which possesses full - stack independent R&D capabilities for enterprise - level solid - state drives (SSDs), successfully passed the ChiNext IPO review. It is expected to become China's "first stock of enterprise - level SSDs". The company plans to raise approximately 1.878 billion yuan for projects such as the R&D of next - generation controller chips and SSDs. The approval for the listing of an unprofitable enterprise not only reflects the capital market's enhanced institutional inclusiveness and adaptability but also demonstrates ChiNext's increased support for high - quality innovative enterprises, starting from mobile phones and gradually expanding to smart glasses, robots, automotive system - on - chips (SoCs), and AI - dedicated chips, helping to build an end - to - end edge AI ecosystem.

## Industries/Concepts

1.  Renminbi Appreciation: On the 25th, the offshore Renminbi (CNY) against the US dollar broke through the 7.0 mark intraday. Huatai Securities notes that the RMB exchange rate has shown a significant upward trend recently. This exchange rate movement has attracted widespread attention. For highly export - oriented manufacturing industries, the appreciation of the RMB may weaken their price competitiveness; for industries dependent on imported raw materials, the rising exchange rate is expected to reduce costs and improve profits. At the macroeconomic level, exchange rate appreciation will also exert a profound impact on China's economic operations by influencing the trade balance, inflation, and capital flows. Overall, the robust internal economic fundamentals, coupled with the weakening US dollar and capital inflows externally, together constitute the main reasons for the recent appreciation of the RMB.

2.  Lithium: According to Shanghai Securities News, Tianqi Lithium has adjusted its spot settlement reference to anchor on "Mysteel + Futures". Public data shows that on December 25, the price range of SMM battery - grade lithium carbonate was 97,800 yuan/ton to 112,000 yuan/ton; the morning market price range of battery - grade lithium carbonate released by Mysteel was 114,500 yuan/ton to 117,200 yuan/ton; and the closing price of the main lithium carbonate futures contract was 123,520 yuan/ton.

Zhongyuan Futures holds that in 2025, the domestic lithium carbonate price generally showed a trend of first declining and then rising. The fundamentals shifted from a loose pattern of increasing supply and stable demand to a pattern of both supply and demand growing. Supply - demand mismatch will become the main theme of the lithium carbonate market in 2026. Looking ahead to 2026, in terms of policies, the focus of new energy vehicle industry policies will shift from "promoting the rapid development of the industry" to "maintaining the stable and orderly development of the industry". The global supply of lithium resources is expected to exceed 2 million tons, a year - on - year increase of 25%.

3.  Consumption: A spokesperson for the Ministry of Commerce stated on the 25th that efforts will be made to further implement the special campaign to boost consumption, organize a series of consumption - expanding activities such as the Spring Festival Consumption Season, Online New Year Shopping Festival, and Time - honored Brand Carnival. China Galaxy Securities argues that boosting consumption is a systematic project, and service consumption has received more attention. The global consumption recovery is slow. High tariffs are pushing up prices, high interest rates are curbing credit demand and thus consumption, and coupled with a weak job market, the recovery of consumer confidence in Europe and the United States is slow. The Central Economic Work Conference proposed adhering to domestic demand - led growth, building a strong domestic market, further implementing the special campaign to boost consumption, and formulating and implementing income - increasing plans for urban and rural residents. It also emphasized expanding the supply of high - quality goods and services and optimizing the implementation of policies related to new technologies and new business forms. Compared with goods consumption, institutions are more optimistic about the improvement prospects of service consumption. Recent relevant policies have significantly increased attention to service consumption. In particular, cleaning up unreasonable restrictive measures in the consumption field is an effective way to release service consumption demand and is expected to yield results gradually.

4.  Humanoid Robots: Beijing Yizhuang officially announced that it will hold the Humanoid Robot Half - Marathon and the Beijing Yizhuang Half - Marathon on April 19, 2026, with the registration channel officially opened. Building on the successful practice last year, the 2026 event will innovatively set up the role of "Robot Service Officer". Robots will provide a variety of services along the track, such as cheering squads, route guidance, garbage collection, and interactive performances, promoting their transformation from event tools to service partners.

5.  Memory Chips: According to the latest memory spot price trend report released by TrendForce, the prices of DDR4, DDR5 memory chips and related modules have continued to rise, but the growth rate has slowed slightly. As a top - tier module supplier, Kingston has recently raised dynamic random - access memory (DRAM) prices sharply, and there are no signs of weakness in overall spot prices. Meanwhile, the NAND flash memory spot market has shown a bullish sentiment driven by expectations of rising contract prices.

6.  Maglev: According to China Securities Journal, recently, the Maglev Team of the National University of Defense Technology set a world record during a maglev experiment. It accelerated a ton - class test vehicle to 700 kilometers per hour within two seconds, becoming the world's fastest test speed for superconducting electrodynamic maglev.

7.  E - cigarettes: The State Tobacco Monopoly Administration publicly solicited opinions on the "Notice of the State Tobacco Monopoly Administration on Implementing E - cigarette Industry Policies to Further Promote the Dynamic Balance Between Supply and Demand (Draft for Comments)". The draft proposes promoting the balance between supply and demand in the e - cigarette market. It will reasonably meet the needs of e - cigarette - related manufacturing enterprises to adjust their production scales based on factors such as market orders, effectively preventing and defusing the risks of unordered market competition. It will strictly implement the total volume control of production scales, adhere to classified policies, and conduct strict reviews on production scale adjustments. Legally and compliantly operating e - cigarette - related manufacturing enterprises will be allowed to carry out capacity integration and restructuring through methods such as merging production sites.

## Today's News Preview

National Development and Reform Commission Press Conference.

Tokyo Consumer Price Index (CPI) for December in Japan.

<End of Full Text>

## Risk Warning and Disclaimer

The market is risky, and investment needs to be cautious. This article does not constitute personal investment advice and does not take into account the specific investment objectives, financial conditions, or needs of individual users. Users should consider whether any opinions, views, or conclusions in this article are in line with their specific circumstances. Investors shall bear their own responsibilities for investments made based on this article.