Enlight Media still lives under the halo of Ne Zha.

Author | Song Wanxin

Editor | Zhang Fan

With "Ne Zha 2" as a strong support, Enlight Media's revenue growth rate in the first three quarters of this year reached the highest level in the same period since its listing.

The financial report released on October 28 showed that the company achieved an operating income of 3.616 billion yuan in the first three quarters, a year-on-year increase of 150.81%; the net profit attributable to the parent company was 2.336 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 406.78%. Among them, in the third quarter alone, Enlight achieved an operating income of 374 million yuan, a year-on-year increase of 247.54%, and the net profit attributable to the parent company was 106 million yuan, a year-on-year soar of 993.71%.

(Source: Enlight Media's financial report)

The movies released and whose revenues were included in the first three quarters include "Ne Zha: Reborn", "One and Only", "The Murder Case of the Flower Girls", "East Pole Island", and "Fei Ren Zai: Limited-Time Player". The movies released in 2024 with part of the box office carried over to the reporting period include "Xiao Qian".

Obviously, "Ne Zha 2", which had a box office of 15.9 billion yuan and ranked fourth globally, contributed the vast majority of the performance. Calculated proportionally, Enlight probably obtained about 3.1 billion yuan in revenue from the 15.9 billion yuan box office.

The stock price trend of film and television companies is highly correlated with hit works.

Under the influence of the hit "Ne Zha 2", Enlight Media's stock price soared to 41.22 yuan in February this year, a sharp increase of 310%, but then halved to about 20 yuan within a month. In addition, although the performance in the third - quarter report reached a new high, the market reaction was flat on the day the financial report was released, and the stock price slightly declined by 0.12%.

This stock price trend reflects that the market's valuation logic for Enlight Media has not changed because of "Ne Zha 2".

The market's investment in film and television companies is still short - sighted, only willing to bet on hits. The strong industry beta attribute has covered up the alpha that Enlight Media has been trying to build.

Wang Changtian's investment methodology

The unstable revenue of film and television companies is a long - standing problem in the industry. How to make money during the periods without hits is the key to changing the industry logic.

Although Enlight Media did not have high - box - office movies in the third quarter after "Ne Zha 2" was taken off the shelves, industry insiders estimated that the company still achieved nearly 100 million yuan in derivative income. This is an indicator of great significance.

In the third quarter, the movies in which Enlight participated in the investment were "East Pole Island", "The Murder Case of the Flower Girls", and "Fei Ren Zai: Limited - Time Player". The box office of all three movies was not ideal, but Enlight was still able to achieve profit growth in the third quarter. In addition to recovering costs by selling shares in advance, this part of the profit mainly came from the long - tail effect of the derivatives of "Ne Zha 2".

That is to say, Enlight has initially verified its ability to increase the non - ticket proportion through IP operation with "Ne Zha 2".

However, consumers' enthusiasm for consuming the "Ne Zha 2" IP is not long - lasting. In the first quarter when the movie was released, IP operation contributed hundreds of millions of yuan in revenue, but this figure dropped significantly to less than 100 million yuan in the third quarter, indicating that the influence of IP - driven consumption is still insufficient. In comparison, the single IP of Labubu, which has no story support, contributed 4.8 billion yuan in revenue to Pop Mart in the first half of this year.

Considering the popularity of "Ne Zha 2", the popularity of the IP economy, which should have had a magnifying effect, is indeed far from that of the movie itself, dragging down the movie. This is related to Enlight's relatively lacking IP operation ability.

Although "Ne Zha 2" is not yet mature in terms of IP operation, it has to be admitted that among current Chinese film and television companies, Enlight, which is not tied to big directors, is the closest to the Chinese Disney. It has mature IPs, industrial chain layout, and more importantly, an investment strategy of "using small to win big".

Caitiaowu is a typical example. Caitiaowu was established ten years ago with a very clear goal of investing in animation studios everywhere.

Entering the animation industry through investment can reduce the high risk of its own original content and at the same time establish industrial chain partners in the early stage. It can be described as killing two birds with one stone. In fact, Caitiaowu plays the role of a content venture capital in the animation movie industry.

Data shows that in 2015 alone, Caitiaowu invested in more than 20 companies in the animation industry chain.

It can be said that betting on director Jiaozi and Coco Studio is the realization of the return on investment made ten years ago. Over the past ten years, there has been a saying in the industry that half of the domestic start - up animation studios are supported by Enlight.

More importantly, as both a movie distributor and a shareholder of the studio, Enlight Media can enjoy the double benefits of these two roles. Wang Changtian, the chairman of Enlight Media, skillfully uses the investment leverage to amplify the benefits brought by a single movie.

With the same investment idea, Enlight Media also placed another more crucial chess piece - Maoyan.

At the beginning of the popularity of the mobile Internet, Wang Changtian realized early on the impact of Internet channels on the film and television industry and believed that the channel side should be deployed as early as possible.

In 2016, Enlight Media acquired 57.4% of the equity of Maoyan Movies and became the controlling shareholder of Maoyan. In the wave of Internet platforms sweeping the film and television circle, Enlight Media is the only traditional private film and television company that heavily invested in a ticketing platform in the early stage.

And Wang Changtian's investment decision was still accurate. He foresaw that in the era of online ticket - buying, the domestic theater scheduling would be dominated by online platform distributors like Maoyan. As the controlling shareholder of Maoyan, it can have more freedom in scheduling.

"Ne Zha 2" is both a highlight and a shadow

After the glorious first - three - quarters financial report, questions like how long the "Ne Zha 2" cake can be enjoyed and when the next "Ne Zha" will appear always emerge in the market after each hit movie.

First of all, looking at the annual movie box office, one "Ne Zha 2" is obviously not enough to drive the overall recovery of the box office. A healthy market does not necessarily need a super - hit, but it definitely needs a continuous and active supply.

In fact, the popularity of "Ne Zha 2" has even become a sad footnote for the film industry this year. During the screening of "Ne Zha 2", it "sucked blood" from the box office of adjacent schedules. Coupled with the fact that there were no hits to continue the popularity during many holiday schedules this year, "Ne Zha 2" has long occupied the top of the schedule box - office list. For example, "Ne Zha 2", which was released in February, was still the third - place finisher in the Tomb - Sweeping Festival schedule box office.

And the latest National Day schedule box office has returned to the level of ten years ago.

(Source: Dengta data)

The slow recovery of the supply side due to cautious sentiment in the three years since the pandemic is the fundamental reason why the movie market is difficult to recover. According to Tuopu data, in the first five months of 2025, the number of nationally filed movies decreased by more than 20% year - on - year, and the number of actually released new movies also decreased by 16%.

The fear of shooting, the fear of making mistakes, and the attempt to avoid risks in various ways have become the main emotions permeating the industry.

Many producers told 36Kr that "even those with a few million or tens of millions of funds dare not make movies for theaters for fear of losses." "The stricter review and the fear of making mistakes have led to a very low efficiency of content production, and people are afraid to shoot."

This further leads to the phenomenon that movies have become more dependent on holiday schedules with more guaranteed box office. A producer pointed out that it is like the fishpond has become smaller, and everyone is crowded together to fish. The gap between the top and the bottom is becoming more and more serious. People either make top - level productions or extremely low - cost projects because these two types have the lowest risks.

The gap between the top and the bottom caused by the combination of schedules and hits reached its peak with "Ne Zha 2" this year.

In the first half of this year, the total national movie box office was 29.231 billion yuan, a year - on - year increase of 22.9%, once approaching the historical peak before the pandemic. However, more than half of the box office (16.1 billion yuan) came from the Spring Festival schedule, and 52.8% of the Spring Festival schedule box office came from "Ne Zha 2".

After the peak, the box office was sluggish for four consecutive months from March to June, and no month exceeded 2 billion yuan.

The characteristic that the movie market has a low tolerance for cost space is naturally more obvious in the longer - cycle animation movies. Film producers need to reduce costs in more aspects, such as labor.

The list of names of more than a hundred animation suppliers at the end of "Ne Zha 2" was once considered spectacular. But the fact is that a huge supplier system composed of hundreds of enterprises cannot be equated with the prosperity of the Chinese animation industry. On the contrary, to some extent, this represents the deformed form of the animation industry with redundant junior workers and the dominance of mature leading companies.

An animator told 36Kr that the large number of junior animators produced by domestic animation majors every year has exceeded the market capacity, but at the same time, the supply of senior animators is insufficient.

"Domestic animation movies are used to using this huge supplier system for operation, while foreign countries adopt the form of project - based employees. However, the former is indeed more conducive to leading companies to gain bargaining power and reduce costs."

Now, Enlight Media, which has content on one hand and channels on the other, already holds the best cards in the film and television circle and the most feasible logic. All it needs is enough patience from the market, but this is also the most difficult thing to obtain in the current environment.

At least according to institutional forecasts, compared with 2025, the forecast values of some institutions for Enlight Media's EPS in 2026 have decreased significantly. At first, Enlight Media was ahead of the times, and now, the times still haven't caught up with Enlight Media.

From the perspective of investors, Enlight Media still lives under the halo of "Ne Zha 2". When Caitiaowu can become the halo itself, it will be the beginning of the logic reversal.

*Disclaimer:

The content of this article only represents the author's views.

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