The "talent poaching" battle among top-tier funds

"Pack your bags and head to Guangzhou!" The talent flow in the public offering fund industry is still accelerating.

Zheng Weishan, a well-known fund manager who just left Galaxy Fund, has quickly joined GF Fund. The Asset Management Association of China (AMAC) disclosed that Zheng Weishan joined GF Fund on October 28; earlier, Wang Xiaoyan, a fixed income fund manager who once managed more than 40 billion yuan at BOC Fund, also joined GF Fund on October 21. She is well known in the market because the products she previously managed had a high proportion of individual investors.

Leading fund companies are frequently poaching talents, and E Fund Management has also strengthened its investment research team. Well-known fund manager Zheng Ning, formerly from BOC Fund, and Liu Xiaoming, former fund manager from AIA-CMB Fund, have been newly appointed recently to start managing products; even earlier, Jiang Xiaoli, the "top female figure" of fixed income products at Tianhong Fund, made a comeback at E Fund Management.

At the same time, to enhance business capabilities, Fullgoal Fund, Zhong Ou Asset Management, Yongying Fund and China Merchants Fund have all been recruiting talents in the market recently. Leading large fund houses have the "financial capability" to poach talents, and to a certain extent, for these large institutions, the speed of internal cultivation is far less effective than poaching talents from outside.

A leading fund company said that in recent years, "fixed income +" has become a sharp tool for scale growth, but its own "fixed income +" team has always been difficult to keep up with the rhythm in terms of performance. Half a year later, the company decisively poached high-performing fund managers from other companies and gave them corresponding positions, quickly making up for its business shortcomings.

In just 10 days, top talents in equity and fixed income sectors joined GF Fund

Within just 10 days, GF Fund recruited a top talent in the equity sector and another top talent in the fixed income sector respectively. The Asset Management Association of China (AMAC) disclosed that Zheng Weishan, the well-known fund manager who just left Galaxy Fund, quickly joined GF Fund on October 28.

Zheng Weishan got his bachelor's degree in applied mathematics and postgraduate degree in statistics. After graduating in 2008, he worked as a sell-side analyst at Guoyuan Securities. In 2014, he joined Invesco Great Wall Fund, and later served as assistant to fund manager and special account investment manager. In 2017, he joined Industrial Fund to be in charge of special account investment, and joined Galaxy Fund in October 2018. Starting from managing Galaxy Innovative Growth in May 2019, he launched his career as a public offering fund manager.

On October 22 this year, Galaxy Fund issued an announcement stating that Zheng Weishan stepped down as the fund manager of three funds including Galaxy Innovative Growth, Galaxy Harmonious Life and Galaxy Intelligent Connection Theme for personal reasons, and would not take other positions in the company. Before leaving, the scale of the funds he managed reached 21 billion yuan, making him the core equity investment talent of Galaxy Fund.

According to usual practice, stepping down from all managed funds means leaving the company, so the industry is not surprised by his official announcement of joining GF Fund. In terms of investment style, Zheng Weishan adopts a relatively "extreme concentration" strategy, prefers technology growth tracks, dares to make heavy positions, does not do band operations, does not chase hot spots, and even pays little attention to short-term valuation fluctuations, with a turnover rate lower than the market average. In terms of performance, his representative product Galaxy Innovative Growth Mixed has achieved a return of 283.56% during his nearly 7 years of tenure.

On October 21, Wang Xiaoyan, a fixed income fund manager who once managed more than 40 billion yuan at BOC Fund, also officially joined GF Fund.

Public information shows that Wang Xiaoyan holds two master's degrees in finance and economics, and has professional qualifications for fund practitioners, inter-bank RMB market traders and inter-bank foreign exchange market traders. She once served as an analyst at Shenyin & Wanguo Securities Research Institute and a portfolio manager in the asset management department of Shanghai Pudong Development Bank; she joined BOC Fund in 2015, and successively served as researcher, assistant to special account investment manager, and special account investment manager.

On October 16, Wang Xiaoyan left BOC Fund. During her tenure at BOC Fund, Wang Xiaoyan managed many bond funds including BOC State-owned Enterprise Bond, BOC Taixiang, BOC Hengyu 9-Month Bond and BOC Zengli Bond. In terms of performance, her representative product BOC State-owned Enterprise Bond has achieved a return of 27.63% over a tenure of more than 5 years, with an annualized return of 4.6%; BOC Steady Income Enhancement Bond has achieved a total return of 20.65% over a tenure of nearly 4 years, with an annualized return of 4.9%, which is quite excellent performance among fixed income products.

E Fund Management also saw a large number of investment research talents join in succession

E Fund Management has also recently welcomed a continuous inflow of investment research talents. Zheng Ning, the former healthcare fund manager from BOC Fund, has officially "returned" to manage products at E Fund Management.

On October 21, E Fund Management issued an announcement, appointing Zheng Ning as the new fund manager of E Fund Medical and Healthcare Equity Securities Investment Fund, who will co-manage the fund with Yang Zhenxiao, while the original fund manager Xu Zheng stepped down. According to usual practice, after the new appointment, the fund will most likely be handed over to Zheng Ning for independent management later.

Zheng Ning's resume is quite outstanding. He started his career as a researcher at Taikang Asset, then joined China Geng Asset Management during Qiu Dunrong's tenure to do research and served as the head of the healthcare team; he joined BOC Fund in 2022, officially started managing public offering funds, and served as the head of the growth-style investment team; he has been working at E Fund Management since March 2026, and once served as an account manager. Zheng Ning delivered relatively good performance during his tenure managing products at BOC Fund, and now he switched to a larger platform to continue managing products.

According to the recently released third quarterly report of E Fund Medical and Healthcare Equity Fund, the fund is optimistic about the global development of China's innovative drug industry, as well as the long-term changes that AI drug discovery may bring to R&D efficiency and industrial division of labor. In terms of innovative drugs, it pays attention to assets that have entered the late stage of global clinical trials, large pharmaceutical companies with strong early R&D platforms, and early-stage products with differentiated clinical potential; in terms of AI drug discovery, it pays attention to AI drug discovery platforms and related life science tool companies that have algorithm, proprietary data, experimental capabilities and pipeline verification capabilities.

In addition to Zheng Ning, E Fund Management has also attracted many well-known fund managers to join recently. On October 17, former AIA-CMB Fund manager Liu Xiaoming has returned to E Fund Management to take over products. Even earlier, Jiang Xiaoli, the "top female figure" of fixed income products at Tianhong Fund, also started her journey of managing products at E Fund Management, and was newly appointed as the fund manager of E Fund Yuehe Steady Bond Fund.

The "talent poaching" war among leading fund companies

Not only GF Fund and E Fund Management, many leading fund companies have been intensively recruiting new talents recently, and the talent flow shows an obvious trend of concentrating on top-tier institutions.

Huang Ding and Zhou Shanshan, former fund managers of Bank of Communications Schroder Fund, joined Fullgoal Fund on October 13 and 22 respectively; in addition, the announcement shows that on October 16, Yu Liping, who is also from Bank of Communications Schroder Fund, returned to Fullgoal Fund to take over products, and was newly appointed as the fund manager of Fullgoal Ruizhe Return Fund, co-managing the product with Yu Bo.

China Merchants Fund, which has gone through the salary limit turmoil, is also actively expanding its team at present, and its poaching targets also point to small and medium-sized fund companies. Zhang Zhicheng, former fund manager of Qianhai United Fund, joined China Merchants Fund on October 22; in September, former Guolian An Fund manager Wu Gang has joined China Merchants Fund.

In addition, Zhong Ou Asset Management is also strengthening its quantitative investment business. Feng Xue, the index enhancement fund manager from former Guolian An Fund, joined Zhong Ou Asset Management on October 14.

From GF Fund and E Fund Management to Fullgoal Fund, China Merchants Fund and Zhong Ou Asset Management, leading fund companies quickly enhance their equity, fixed income or index enhancement business lines through precise poaching. Star fund managers have seen particularly frequent changes at present, some choose to switch to private offering funds, some choose to move from one public offering fund to another, and among those who choose to stay in the public offering sector, platform strength, investment research resources and incentive mechanisms have become the key factors to attract star fund managers.

This article is from the WeChat Official Account "China Fund News" (ID: chinafundnews), author: Yan Jun, published with authorization from 36Kr.