YUNNAN BAIYAO(000538) 金融界·2025-03-31 17:00Core Insights - Yunnan Baiyao's 2024 annual report shows a revenue of 40.033 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 2.36%, and a net profit of 4.749 billion yuan, reflecting a 16.02% growth. Despite the seemingly stable data, underlying issues such as slowing core business growth, reliance on non-recurring gains, and lagging innovation are emerging, indicating long-term risks [1] Group 1: Business Performance - The core products, adhesive bandages and toothpaste, dominate the market with a 66.5% share in the adhesive bandage sector and a 24.6% share in the toothpaste market, both maintaining industry leadership. However, market penetration is nearing saturation, with adhesive bandage market share stable between 65%-67% for three consecutive years and toothpaste growth slowing since 2019 [2] - The revenue structure shows an increasing proportion of low-margin commercial sales, which accounted for 65% of total revenue in 2024, significantly dragging down overall gross margin. The gross margin for industrial sales was 67.37%, while commercial sales had a mere 6.29% margin, indicating limited room for core profitability improvement [2] Group 2: Profit Structure - The high growth in net profit is significantly supported by non-recurring gains, with a notable decline in securities investment gains in Q3 2024, dropping to 8.03 million yuan from 179 million yuan in the same period of 2023. Despite this, total investment income for the first three quarters reached 320 million yuan, constituting 7.4% of net profit [3] - The profit structure is fragile, as past experiences of significant losses from stock trading have raised concerns. The aggressive dividend policy, with 4.279 billion yuan distributed in 2024, accounting for 90.09% of net profit, may hinder cash flow for R&D and business expansion [3] Group 3: Innovation and R&D - Yunnan Baiyao's R&D investment is lagging, with only 120 million yuan allocated in 2024, representing a mere 0.3% of revenue, significantly below the industry average of 3%-5%. In contrast, sales expenses reached 3.678 billion yuan, highlighting a severe imbalance [4] - Progress on existing innovation projects is slow, with key diagnostic reagent projects still in early clinical stages and related business revenue accounting for less than 5% in 2024. Compared to competitors like Pizaihuang, which achieved a 28% net profit growth with over 4% R&D investment, Yunnan Baiyao's innovation trajectory appears unclear [5] - The company has only 156 effective invention patents as of the end of 2024, with growth of less than 10% since 2020, while peers have seen over 30% increases, indicating a potential loss of opportunities during a favorable policy environment for traditional Chinese medicine innovation [5]