Hong Hao's "Planet" vs Li Bei's "Classroom"

In the past few years, investing has become an increasingly difficult business from which to make stable profits.

But at the same time, in some "business directions" that have been less explored before, some investors with strong popularity (commonly known as “big V investors”) are eagerly opening up new business frontiers.

Internet celebrity economist Hong Hao started "recruiting members" on the paid platform Zhishi Xingqiu (Knowledge Planet) at the end of October, and the latest membership number has surpassed 14,000. With an “annual fee” of 899 yuan per person, his “nominal income” has exceeded 12.5 million yuan in two months.

Right after that, Li Bei, who also has a large following, started collaborating with a major online platform to launch "courses" costing 12,888 yuan for four days, with expected income reaching the million-yuan level.

When traditional channels such as asset management and investment research become increasingly difficult to "monetize," some industry professionals seem to be bypassing established performance and institutional evaluation systems, and directly re-pricing their own expertise...

Li Bei “Opens Classes”

Recently, Half-Summer Investment announced via its official WeChat account that founder Li Bei will hold an offline investment course sharing event in Shanghai.

Notably, this information was publicly released in the official voice of a private fund manager.

Looking at the course setup, this event is not a single lecture, but a complete offline system composed of four classes, covering basic investment knowledge for ordinary investors, asset classes and market style judgment, analysis of potential opportunities and risks, among other topics.

According to the poster: the full set of systematic courses is priced at 12,888 yuan, with support for single-class registration at 3,888 yuan each.

The registration progress has also attracted market attention.

Subsequently, Half-Summer Investment’s official WeChat showed that only two days elapsed from posting the course information to completing member recruitment, with all 200 slots filled.

Using the most conservative estimate—assuming all attendees only purchased the single class—the minimum income would be 200 people times 3,888 yuan, totaling about 777,600 yuan.

Factoring in the full course price, the actual amount is clearly much higher.

“Easily Achieve” Annualized Returns of 10%?

From course posters and disclosed information, the core of these offline courses is not specific investment recommendations, but instead focused on building investors’ cognitive frameworks.

Including: how to identify common investment scams, which financial instruments are not suitable for most people, and key risks most easily overlooked in ordinary investing, etc.

The most attention-getting part is the phrase on the poster claiming “easily achieve long-term annualized returns of over 10%.”

But it’s exactly here where “controversy” begins to arise.

On the one hand, anti-fraud education and risk warnings are closer to investor protection contexts.

On the other, targeting long-term annualized returns at around 10% is a challenging goal for industry professionals to achieve in today’s low-return market environment. It’s unclear how she will teach ordinary people to “easily achieve” it.

This kind of phrasing, which straddles risk reminders and painting returns, is itself apt to trigger differing interpretations, and is a focal point for the outside world.

Do Product Annualized Returns Hold Up at 10%?

Let’s not talk about teaching it; have the fund managers themselves achieved annualized returns of 10%?

According to data disclosed by Simuwu Paipai (private fund ranking website), a representative product from Half-Summer Investment has, since the end of 2018, had a cumulative net value increase noticeably higher than the CSI 300 index over the same period.

Roughly calculated, if this period is considered about seven years, the corresponding long-term annualized return does exceed 10%.

However, this representative product’s performance over the past three years has not been ideal, with negative returns and its net value experiencing notable drawdowns. Affected by this, Half-Summer Investment’s assets under management have also fallen; it’s no longer in the 10-billion-yuan private fund camp, and some clients have chosen to exit.

In other words, even though the annualized level is high when the timeframe is extended, the investment process itself is not a straight upward path.

For ordinary investors, this is the part most easily overlooked when thinking about “annualized 10%”:

Annualized return is the average result over years of ups and downs; it does not mean every year or every three years can consistently achieve this level.

Macro Strategy is a "Hot" Course Topic

Interestingly, although teaching this is very difficult, Half-Summer Investment’s macro hedging strategy course is precisely an industry hot topic.

Among various investment courses, this is the one most likely to spark investor interest; but at the same time, macro hedging strategies are ones that even industry professionals seldom pursue.

On one hand, this strategy demands high depth of research, a sound and effective theoretical system, and frequent updates to the manager’s philosophy and execution rhythm.

On the other hand, in practice, it is among the hardest strategies to stably replicate.

Because of this, a "problem" emerges. With such strategy labels, fund managers should be investing vast energy into research, investing, and risk control—frequent public appearances may distract them.

Of course, traditional private fund clients are mainly high-net-worth individuals. Using courses to build communication channels, or to establish a small, high-threshold social circle, seems to be an unspoken value of such classes.

Another Monetization Path for Big Vs

If Li Bei’s offline course reflects private fund managers sharing experience on a small scale, on another online channel, a similar transformation is happening faster and more directly.

On October 25, economist Hong Hao announced the official launch of paid subscription services for individual investors. This service, hosted on the Zhishi Xingqiu platform, uses an annual subscription model, letting users access his macro views, analysis, and interactive Q&A after payment.

According to the page, as of December 30, membership had reached 14,000, with the subscription priced at 899 yuan per year.

The simplest estimate yields a “nominal income” of about 12.5 million yuan.

Even considering that Zhishi Xingqiu takes a high cut, individual investors could take home up to 80% of the “nominal income” (before channel deductions).

For a paid personal product that's been online just under three months, the income of the “star owner” (big V) is already impressive—close to the annual management fee of a small private fund.

In terms of content, Hong Hao’s Zhishi Xingqiu centers on his macro analysis system developed over years, including personal models and indicators, judgments about market turning points and opportunities, real-time updates, and direct member Q&A interactions.

Compared to Li Bei’s offline course model, the difference is even clearer.

Hong Hao’s career path also provides practical foundation for this conversion.

Public information shows he did sell-side research for many years, serving as head of strategy at Bocom International for nearly a decade. In 2022, he joined hedge fund Serein Group as chief economist. In April this year, he became CEO of Huafu International, briefly returning to the sell-side, but soon resigned and switched to being managing partner and CIO of Lotus Asset Management, returning to a personal brand-driven career.

The Side Effects of Investing Becoming Difficult

Broadly speaking, over a longer time frame, this wave of change is happening not only in the private fund buy-side, and monetization is not limited to just courses and Zhishi Xingqiu.

Amid the trend of investing getting harder and pay getting lower, many finance professionals are developing their own means of “transition” and “monetization” based on accumulated knowledge, strong communication skills, and expressive ability.

Some went into insurance brokering;

Some ventured into industry;

Some do consulting and intermediary work;

Some focus on education and training;

Ultimately, all roads lead to Rome—the fundamental logic of financial services is universal.

Risk Disclosure and DisclaimerThe market has risks; investments should be made cautiously. This article does not constitute personal investment advice, nor does it consider the special investment goals, financial situation, or needs of individual users. Users should consider whether any opinions, viewpoints, or conclusions in this article are suitable for their own circumstances. Investing based on this is at your own risk.