Haiguang's 45% profit guide includes a 740 million yuan share charge. Sugon's 78% starts from a thin base

Haiguang guides to 38% to 52% profit growth after a 740 million yuan share pay charge. Before that charge, growth is 70% to 84%. Sugon's 78% starts from an 11% net margin.

Haiguang Information and Sugon, two of China's largest domestic compute suppliers, published nine month profit numbers on the evening of 15 October. Haiguang guided to growth of 38% to 52%. Sugon reported 78.5%. At first glance, the server maker appears to be growing faster than the chip designer.

Sugon leads on core growth, but from a thin base. Haiguang's guide includes a 740 million yuan charge for paying staff in shares. Without it, profit grows about 77%. Haiguang is ahead on margin and on the size of its yuan gain.

Haiguang's announcement is a voluntary guide, meaning a forecast, and it is unaudited. It expects nine month revenue of 14.28 billion to 15.58 billion yuan, up 50% to 64%. Net profit attributable to shareholders is guided at 2.71 billion to 2.98 billion yuan, up 38% to 52%.

The same filing gives a second range that excludes share based payments, meaning pay in company stock. That range is 3.45 billion to 3.72 billion yuan, up 70% to 84%. The gap between the two ranges is 740 million yuan at both ends. That is the charge Haiguang expects to book in the first nine months of 2026, and it is easy to miss in the headline figure.

Working backward from the stated growth rates gives a 2025 base of about 2.03 billion yuan before the charge. Last year's equivalent charge was therefore about 66 million yuan, so the cost rose by roughly 674 million yuan in a year. Reported profit absorbs that cost as awards vest, meaning as staff earn their shares.

That swing explains an apparent margin problem. Reported profit growth of about 45% at the midpoint trails revenue growth of about 57%. Before the charge, profit grows about 77%, well ahead of revenue.

Stock pay is a real cost, and a measure that excludes it flatters the reported result. A vesting charge is also lumpy, so a 740 million yuan year says little about the next one.

The filing's strictest cut also strips out one off items and still shows 70% to 83%, so a one off gain is not carrying the result. The trend across several quarters matters more than any single filing, and Haiguang's quarterly charge will show it. Even on the reported number, Haiguang's gain is 749 million to 1.02 billion yuan, compared with Sugon's 758 million yuan.

Sugon Information Industry's preliminary results are an express, meaning early actual results rather than a forecast. They are unaudited. Revenue was 12.24 billion yuan, up 38.75%. Net profit attributable was 1.72 billion yuan, up 78.48%.

Profit excluding one off items was 1.55 billion yuan, up 105%. That is the fair comparison with Haiguang's 70% to 83% on the same basis, and Sugon is well ahead on growth. The one off items were about 169 million yuan, roughly a tenth of total profit.

The reason is the base. A year earlier Sugon turned 8.82 billion yuan of revenue into 966 million yuan of profit. That is a net margin, meaning profit as a share of revenue, of about 11%. This year the same calculation gives 14%.

The filing credits stronger demand for domestic compute, higher sales of high end computers and IT equipment, and higher margin software. It also says gross margin improved. Sugon's 105% is therefore a recovery on a thin base: it adds about 797 million yuan on a 757 million yuan base.

Haiguang's gain before share pay adds about 1.56 billion yuan at the midpoint because it sits on a bigger earnings base. A faster percentage on a smaller denominator says little about which business is stronger.

Scale and margin sharpen the comparison. At the guided midpoint, Haiguang earns a net margin of about 19% after absorbing the 740 million yuan charge. Its revenue of roughly 14.9 billion yuan is about 22% more than Sugon's 12.2 billion.

The difference in layers matters more than either growth rate. A chip supplier keeps more of each yuan spent on AI compute than the system integrator that buys the processors and sells the finished machines. Sugon's margin is rising, but it is earned on servers and IT equipment.

Haiguang attributes its growth to domestic substitution moving from policy driven to market driven. Both its CPU lines, which are general processors, and its DCU lines, which are AI accelerator chips, are in demand. If that holds, the margin gap is structural.

For a cloud or telecom buyer of domestic servers, Sugon's rising margin on 39% revenue growth suggests pricing and mix are moving in the seller's favour. That argues for locking framework prices before year end rather than waiting for capacity. This is our reading, not something the filing says.

Haiguang sits one layer down, so a tender for its chips faces a supplier with more pricing room than the box maker. Buyers should expect the chip layer to hold its margin while system prices stay contested.

Sugon's express can still move because the filing says the figures may differ from its quarterly report by up to 20%. Haiguang will publish its 2026 third quarter report on 20 October. At the guided midpoint, nine month profit before share based payments would be about 3.6 billion yuan. The split of the charge will show whether the 740 million is a one year vesting spike or a new run rate.