The 2nd anniversary of the "9・24" market surge: A-share market capitalization has soared by 45 trillion yuan, with 1430 individual stocks doubling in value.
Image source: Tuchong
Author | Xiulan He
Editor | Siting Wen
On the eve of the Mid-Autumn Festival, the A-share market continued to show a trend of shrinking volume consolidation.
On September 24, the Shanghai Composite Index continued to pull back, closing at 3888.37 points, down 1.22%, more than 111 points away from the 4000-point integer threshold. The total trading volume of the Shanghai and Shenzhen bourses reached 1.67 trillion yuan for the whole day, marking a decline for two consecutive trading days. From the short-term market perspective, this is only the normal capital wait-and-see sentiment before the long holiday. But extending the time dimension, the current position of the Shanghai Composite Index is exactly about 41% above the starting point of the policy-driven market two years ago, becoming a key node for observing this round of structural bull market in the A-share market.
September 24, 2024, is the core turning point of this round of market. On that day, the heads of the People's Bank of China, the State Administration of Financial Regulation, and the China Securities Regulatory Commission rarely appeared on the same stage at a press conference held by the State Council Information Office, announcing a 0.5 percentage point RRR cut, a 20 basis point cut in the 7-day reverse repo rate, and creating two new structural monetary policy tools directly targeting the capital market: the securities, fund, and insurance company swap facility, and the relending for share repurchase and increase.
With strong policy support, sentiment in the A-share market was quickly ignited. On that day, the Shanghai Composite Index surged 4.15%, rebounding strongly from around 2800 points. On September 30, the index rose by more than 8% in a single day. On the first trading day after the holiday (October 8), the total market transaction reached 3.48 trillion yuan, hitting a phased high volume, completely ending the previous weak consolidation pattern.
Since the "9·24" market, after two years of evolution, this policy-driven bull market has achieved large-scale expansion. As of September 23, 2026, the total market value of A-shares was 115.59 trillion yuan (caliber announced by exchanges), an increase of about 45 trillion yuan compared with before the market started (the total market value at the close of September 24, 2024 was 70.87 trillion yuan). As of September 24, 2026, the Shanghai Composite Index has risen by 41.45% cumulatively, the Shenzhen Component Index has risen by about 64.75%, and the ChiNext Index and the STAR Market Composite Index have risen by 114.89% and 152.03% respectively.
However, behind the rising index, the differentiation of market profit-making effect is obvious. "Index bull market, hard to make profits from individual stocks" has become the real experience of most investors. Data shows that since 2026, the median rise and fall of all A-share individual stocks is -12.4%. In July this year, the market underwent a deep correction, breaking the profit pattern of the first half of the year. A large number of investors saw their previously accumulated floating profits sharply eroded, and even turned from profit to loss. Structural differentiation has become an important feature of this two-year market.
Three rounds of market iteration: from policy valuation repair to technology performance main rise
Reviewing the context of the two-year market, this round of A-share bull market can be roughly divided into three stages of iterative market. The driving logic has gradually shifted from policy sentiment dominance to fundamental performance driving, and now it has entered the stage of stock shock rotation.
The first stage was the policy-driven valuation repair from the fourth quarter of 2024 to 2025. After the policy combination landed beyond expectations, the risk appetite that had been suppressed for several years in the market was released intensively. The large financial sector took the lead in starting, securities firms hit the limit up in batches, and investors queuing up to open accounts became a social phenomenon. The rise in this stage was driven by policy expectations and sentiment repair. The Shanghai Composite Index continued to climb from the 2800-point line, and although there were repetitions during the period, the upward trend was clear.
The second stage fell on the technology performance main rise market in the first half of 2026. After experiencing the previous valuation repair, the marginal force of policy expectation driving the market weakened, and the profit growth of listed companies became the core main line of market pricing. The performance of hard technology tracks such as AI and semiconductors ushered in an explosion, supporting the continuous strengthening of the sector.
According to the 2026 mid-term report statistics, the total attributable net profit (TTM) of the constituent stocks of the CSI Artificial Intelligence Index (931071.CSI) is 112.858 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 70.27%. The total attributable net profit (TTM) of the constituent stocks of the CSI All-Share Semiconductor Index (H30184.CSI) is 94.292 billion yuan, a year-on-year surge of 119.75%. Benefiting from the dual dividends of the global AI capital expenditure rise and semiconductor domestic substitution, the computing power infrastructure, semiconductor equipment and materials, and AI chip tracks continue to release performance. The cumulative increase of the STAR 50 Index from "9·24" to the stage high in the first half of 2026 once exceeded 250%, and the growth tracks led the entire market.
The third stage is the stock shrinking volume consolidation stage from July 2026 to present. After the technology sectors collectively underwent deep correction in July, and popular stocks such as Zhenbao Technology (688797.SH), Demingli (001309.SZ), Jiangbolong (301308.SZ) generally retreated by 50% to 60%, the market speculation sentiment cooled down, and the market as a whole entered a consolidation period of stock or even shrinking volume game. Until the recent week, after the Fed's interest rate hike landed, the trading volume returned to above 2 trillion yuan. From September 14 to 18, the STAR 50 surged 6.39% in a single week, and the trading volume of the two exchanges expanded day by day from 1.6 trillion yuan at the beginning of the week to 2.08 trillion yuan on September 18. On September 21, the Shanghai Composite Index closed up 0.97% at 3949.91 points, more than 4500 individual stocks closed higher, and the pharmaceutical biology and real estate sectors rose in tandem. On September 23 and 24, the pre-holiday effect appeared, the market shrank again, and the index fluctuated in a narrow range near 3900 points.
In the two-year bull market process, the A-share industry market value pattern has completed the most profound round of reconstruction in recent years, and the valuation of old and new economic tracks has completed a thorough switch. As of September 23, the electronics industry has become the largest incremental track in this round of market, with the total market value soaring from 5.75 trillion yuan two years ago to 23.93 trillion yuan, an increase of 316.43%, surpassing the banking industry that has long dominated the list and becoming the largest industry by market value in A-shares.
In addition, the communication and non-ferrous metal sectors also performed impressively, with two-year increases of 184.94% and 117.81% respectively, leading the 31 Shenwan primary industries. In sharp contrast, the traditional consumer sector continued to weaken, the food and beverage industry recorded a 13% decline in the interval, and the yield gap between the top and bottom of the industry exceeded 340 percentage points. The logic of capital voting has been completely reconstructed, and the technology tracks corresponding to new production factors such as computing power have become the core allocation direction of the market.
The other side of the bull market: rising difficulty in making profits
From the index dimension, A-shares in the past two years are an undoubted bull market, but when it comes to individual stock investment returns, many people's experience is much more complicated.
Wind data shows that from September 24, 2024 to September 24, 2026, the average increase of all A-share individual stocks reached 85.1%, the median increase was 42.61%, 1430 stocks doubled their share prices, 25 stocks rose ten times, among which Yuanjie Technology (688498.SH) recorded a cumulative increase of more than 27 times, giving birth to many super bull stocks.
However, there is also a structural imbalance in the market in the same interval: 929 stocks did not rise but fell, with an average pullback of more than 20%. Traditional large-cap blue chips such as Sinopec (600028.SH), Wuliangye (000858.SZ), and Beijing-Shanghai High Speed Railway (601816.SH) have become samples "forgotten" by capital in the bull market. The differentiation in the time dimension is also obvious. In the first half of 2026, technology stocks siphoned market liquidity, and traditional sectors continued to decline slowly. In July, the technology sectors underwent deep correction, the previous popular targets retreated sharply, and the short-term profit-making effect of the market faded rapidly.
The market ecology has also been quietly rewritten amid the continuous tightening of supervision. The "2025 China Securities Regulatory Commission Report on the Construction of Law-based Government" disclosed by the CSRC in March this year shows that in 2025, 701 securities and futures illegal cases were investigated and dealt with, the total amount of fines and confiscations reached 15.474 billion yuan, and 172 clues of suspected criminal cases were transferred to public security organs. The new share reduction regulations implemented in 2024 comprehensively regulate all kinds of "detour share reduction" behaviors from the rule level, such as share reduction through technical divorce, securities lending transfer, and short selling share reduction. Under multiple institutional constraints, the living space for shell resources and pure theme speculation has been greatly compressed.
However, market sentiment speculation has not completely disappeared. Shengu Group (601091.SH), which was listed recently, surged by more than 373% on the first day and rose by more than 177% the next day. The speculation of new stocks without price limit is still a surging sentiment outlet in the market.
Standing at the key node of the second anniversary of the "9·24" market, the rhythm of the future market and allocation direction have attracted much attention recently.
In terms of the external environment, overseas liquidity tightening repeatedly disturbs the market. In the early morning of Beijing time on September 17, the Federal Reserve announced a 25 basis point interest rate hike, raising the target range of the federal funds rate to 3.75% to 4.00%, the first time since July 2023. The dot plot shows that there may be another interest rate hike within the year, and the 10-year U.S. bond yield once stood at 5%. In contrast, China's LPR has remained unchanged for 16 consecutive months, and the "self-centered" monetary policy is clearly misaligned with overseas tightening.
Yang Delong, chief economist and fund manager of Qianhai Open Source Fund, told Times Finance that the Fed's interest rate hike in September has landed, and the next interest rate meeting will not be until the end of October. Therefore, before that, the market's concerns about the Fed's interest rate hike have been greatly reduced, which brings opportunities for the market rebound in the fourth quarter. As the final battle of the year, the market may see a wave of rebound to repair the gap caused by the decline in the third quarter, and then gradually achieve valuation repair, but the market differentiation will still be very obvious.
For the main line of the future market, institutions are generally optimistic about the long-term opportunities of the technology tracks.
Yang Delong pointed out that stocks in technology directions such as artificial intelligence, semiconductors, and computing power may still have relatively large opportunities in the future. The core factors driving the development of the AI technology industry are policy support on the one hand. China proposed the "AI+" action very early to empower all walks of life through artificial intelligence. Second, the demand for chip computing power brought by AI reasoning has exploded, which has brought direct performance explosion opportunities for AI hardware, thus supporting the growth of stock prices on the performance level. Third, China and the United States have leading advantages in the field of artificial intelligence development, and other countries can only participate or follow basically. China has already had a large leading advantage in the field of artificial intelligence development, especially China's electricity is relatively cheap, and computing power is also very cheap, so it can have unique advantages in the development of large models and other directions.
"So in the fourth quarter, everyone can continue to pay attention to the development of AI technology," Yang Delong said.
Zheshang Securities analysis pointed out that while being optimistic about the bull market framework led by AI, phased strategy revision is carried out. Policy support combined with solid fundamentals ensures that the "systematic slow bull" framework remains unchanged, but the high overseas interest rate, cooling trading volume and crowdedness digestion limit the space for further rapid valuation expansion. The market in the fourth quarter may perform as range fluctuation and industry rotation.
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This article is from the WeChat official account "Times Finance APP" (ID: tf-app), author: Xiulan He, published by 36Kr with authorization.