Suddenly, the "Ning King" came out to make a splash again.

On the evening of July 24, CATL released two major documents simultaneously. One was the 2026 Interim Financial Report. Revenue in the first half was 276.91 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 54.80%. Net profit attributable to the parent company was 43.284 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 41.98%. Calculated, this means daily earnings of 240 million yuan.

The other was a buyback plan, proposing to use funds not less than 20 billion yuan and not more than 40 billion yuan to buy back A-share shares for cancellation, with a buyback price cap of 573 yuan per share, a premium of nearly 50% compared to the closing price of the day. This amount cap set a record high for single share buybacks in the history of A-shares.

At the same time, multiple new energy vehicle manufacturers successively released half-year profit forecasts, with many facing profit pressure. Industry chain profits are visibly concentrating on the battery segment, and this is indeed a major source of CATL's profits. However, if you turn to the details of CATL's financial report, you will find a fact overlooked by the outside world.

That is CATL's true growth engine is actually not just power batteries. Or rather, the game CATL is playing is far bigger than what the outside world sees.

Beyond Vehicle Power Batteries, Pulling Up a Second Growth Curve

In CATL's financial report, the most worth noting is its healthy revenue structure. In the first half, the power battery business contributed 192.125 billion yuan in revenue, accounting for 69.38%, remaining the absolute major portion. However, the performance of the other two businesses is also inescapable, showing a trend of accelerated growth.

First, energy storage battery business revenue was 53.261 billion yuan, accounting for 19.23%, a year-on-year increase of 87.54%. Battery materials and recycling, mineral resource business revenue was 18.811 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 67.23%.

More critically, power battery gross margin of 20.63% and energy storage battery 23.96% both saw year-on-year declines, while the gross margin of battery materials and recycling business reached 27.04%, an increase of 5.81 percentage points year-on-year.

That is to say, among the three major main businesses, the only one achieving gross margin improvement is the "recycling business" that outsiders ignore most easily.

Looking further down, CATL has also accumulated considerable capital in the ship power battery field.

Already cumulatively delivered over 900 ship batteries. The first all-electric inland container ship exported from China delivered in the first half of 2026, also equipped with CATL's battery energy storage system. In July, also acquired a stake in Jiangsu Kaiyang Shipbuilding Company, increasing investment in the technical development of ocean-going ship battery systems.

In the commercial vehicle field, sodium-ion batteries have gone into mass production installation, the Tianxing series covers multiple sub-scenarios from logistics vehicles to heavy trucks. In the battery recycling field, holding company Bangpu Recycling has built the nation's largest directional recycling base, with an annual retired battery processing capacity of 270,000 tons, and nickel, cobalt, and manganese recovery rate is as high as 99.6%. The team also won two honors at the European Patent Office's "2026 European Inventor Award" this year, becoming the first Chinese team to win dual awards since the award's inception.

These businesses together constitute CATL's second growth curve beyond power batteries.

When lithium battery scrap volume grows at a speed of more than 20% annually, when the commercialization window for electric ships opens gradually, and when AI computing power data centers begin to propose new structural demands on energy supply, CATL has already extended its tentacles into these tracks. Company executives also clearly stated at the performance exchange meeting that AIDC presents a clear structural market opportunity. CATL will not just provide single product supply, but wants to provide more comprehensive solutions around new energy scenarios.

Therefore, from the financial report it can be seen that CATL's high-speed profit growth in the first half, a large part comes from storage, from recycling, from overseas, rather than simply "earning one more cent" from vehicle manufacturers.

Of course, a fact must be admitted here. The gross margin of the power battery business is indeed declining, price competition pressure in the domestic market is real. Moreover, CATL also has its shortcomings.

The "poaching talent and stealing technology" publicly condemned by Zeng Yuqun previously, lost orders in the Middle East market, additional costs brought by consumption tax policies, these are challenges on the table. It's just that these challenges have not covered up the longer-term growth curve.

Earn Money from "Foreigners", Also Earn Money for the Future

If diversification is CATL's first line of defense against industry risk, then globalization is the second moat it built. From this point of view, CATL is also half a step ahead of current auto companies. The overseas dividends it received are exactly the "big results" that current auto companies are striving hard to layout overseas business to obtain.

In the first half, CATL overseas revenue reached 87.1 billion yuan, gross margin 29.97%, nearly 9 percentage points higher than domestic business gross margin. Overseas market share 33.7%, Hungary, US, Indonesia three overseas factories successively put into production, Volkswagen, BMW, Toyota and other global mainstream car companies lie in the customer list.

Morgan Stanley gave a judgment in the latest report. Diesel vehicle electrification, storage super cycle, sodium-ion battery product cycle, will jointly support CATL to continue strong growth in 2027.

The key point is, CATL overseas business gross margin is significantly higher than domestic. This means, its bargaining power in the global market is actually stronger than in domestic. This is somewhat different from the common perception that "Made in China conquers the world with low prices".

CATL management gave the explanation at the exchange meeting as "Competing on value, not price". This sounds a bit official, but combining with gross margin data, it indeed has its confidence.

Zeng Yuqun summarized CATL's current strategic positioning into one sentence: From "New Energy Industrialization" to "Industrial New Energyization". The first half is what CATL did in the past ten years, making the concept of new energy into a real industry. The second half is what it plans to do in the future, using new energy to transform more traditional industries.

Ships, commercial vehicles, computing power data centers, mineral resources, these are all the landing points of "Industrial New Energyization". Zeng Yuqun himself judged, the future downstream industry boundaries may reach over a thousand times the current level.

And if this judgment holds, then the 40 billion buyback big move is easy to understand.

The company's current stock price is undervalued, this is the core logic of the buyback. On the day the financial report was released, CATL A-share closing price was 383.01 yuan, while the 52-week high was 468.75 yuan. Performance hit a new high, but the stock price fell nearly 20% in half a year. CITIC Securities gave a target price of 490 yuan, UBS 600 yuan, Macquarie HK stock target price 700 HKD.

Under this premise, the real money 40 billion buyback is an attitude given by management to the market.

More importantly, the implementation, all bought-back shares are used for cancellation, not kept for equity incentives, nor placed in treasury stock accounts. This means total share capital decreases by about 69.8 million shares, rights allocated to each shareholder will rise.

Of course, this confidence also needs some question marks. Lithium prices recently showed a rebound, Yichun Jianxiwo lithium mine resumption approval may bring cost fluctuations, consumption tax phased collection from 2% to 4% test on downstream bargaining power, are realities CATL must face next.

However, compared to challenges, this financial report indeed let us see a strong resilience and strategic vision shown by an industry leader. From this point of view, CATL is still the undoubted leader of the new energy sector, without a doubt.