April's top stocks announced! These two companies are being watched by multiple brokerages

Why are AI and brokerage firms collectively optimistic about Zhongji Xuchuang and China National Offshore Oil Corporation?

Text | Niu Ben

‍After several days of adjustment, global stock markets experienced a strong rebound today (April 1), and the A-share market followed suit. Driven by hot sectors such as innovative drugs, optical modules (CPO), and copper-clad laminates, the market began to recover, with multiple related stocks like Ruizhi Pharmaceuticals, Guangsheng Tang, and Aidi Pharmaceuticals hitting the “20CM” daily limit.

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Hot sectors all rising

By the close today, the Shanghai Composite Index was at 3,948.55 points, up 1.46%; the Shenzhen Component Index was at 13,706.52 points, up 1.70%; and the ChiNext Index was at 3,247.52 points, up 1.96%. In terms of sectors, except for the previously leading oil and petrochemical and coal sectors, all other sectors closed higher, with hot sectors blooming across the board. Notably, indices related to innovative drugs topped the gainers list, and representatives of technological growth such as optical modules, optical circuit switches (OCS), optical chips, and copper-clad laminates also rose.

In individual stocks, multiple related stocks like Ruizhi Pharmaceuticals, Guangsheng Tang, and Aidi Pharmaceuticals hit the “20CM” daily limit, while Kelai Ying, Peking University Medicine, and Mingpu Optoelectronics reached the “10CM” daily limit, with stocks like Tanfeng Communications, Shijia Photonics, and Kanglong Huacheng also rising.

Senior industry insider Peng Zu has already issued important warnings on this. Regarding innovative drugs, he said, “Last year, BD (business development) was the busiest year in history; this year should be the period for performance realization.” Moreover, in the first three months of this year, China’s innovative drug licensing transactions exceeded $60 billion, nearly half of the total for 2025. Catalysts include the intensive convening of core international academic conferences on innovative drugs, such as the European Lung Cancer Conference (ELCC) on March 25, the AACR 2026 on April 17, and the ASCO 2026 annual meeting on May 29.

The same applies to mainstream sectors like optical modules and optical circuit switches, and Peng Zu has also included leading companies like Shijia Photonics, which has continued to lead the rise, into key tracking cases, yielding nearly tenfold returns.

April’s Top Stocks Revealed

Similar to Peng Zu’s observations, many companies in hot sectors such as innovative drugs, optical modules, and copper-clad laminates have also become brokerages’ top stocks for April.

According to my statistics, there are currently 247 top stocks for April recommended by brokerages, many of which are companies in related hot sectors. For example, Zhongji Xuchuang is viewed by brokerages as a global leader in optical modules with extremely strong core competitiveness. According to LightCounting data, it ranks first among global optical module manufacturers in 2023-2024. Currently, optical modules are mainly used in scale-out networks, while scale-up networks focus on connections within a single node, traditionally using copper cables. As the number of GPUs within a single node continues to increase, the demand for transmission distance and bandwidth is rising, and copper cable connections are nearing their limits. The penetration of optical interconnect technology in scale-up networks is expected to further increase, and scale-up applications could become a growth driver for the company.

It is worth noting that Zhongji Xuchuang is also one of the most jointly recommended stocks by brokerages, with six firms, and China National Offshore Oil Corporation (CNOOC) also has six, because brokerages believe that the high prosperity of the oil and gas industry may continue, and the company has advantages of low cost and steady volume growth.

Additionally, several other companies in hot sectors have received joint recommendations from four or more brokerages (see Table 1).

Performance collectively explodes

Currently, the period of intensive disclosure of annual reports by listed companies has begun. Many top stocks have released formal reports or quick reports. Based on my review, about over a hundred companies have done so. Overall, April’s brokerage top stocks are mostly high-performing, with over 80% showing earnings growth.

Among them, many stocks not only belong to hot sectors but also have significant performance increases, such as Leading Intelligent. The company is a global leader in new energy intelligent manufacturing solutions, benefiting from the recovery of downstream industry demand. During the reporting period, it achieved a net profit attributable to parent of 1.56B yuan, a year-on-year increase of 446.58%. This is also the main reason it became a brokerage top stock in April. Guotou Securities believes that with the high prosperity of power + energy storage, the company’s performance inflection point has arrived, and profits are expected to grow rapidly. Meanwhile, the trend of solid-state batteries is obvious. The company is a leader in liquid batteries, with full-line capabilities, and is expected to replicate the advantages of liquid batteries, maintaining strength among the strong.

In addition, other stocks with significant performance increases among April’s top stocks include Shijia Photonics, Zhimingda, and Changxin Bochuang, among which 13 companies have seen their performance increase by more than 100% (see Table 2).

(The stocks mentioned in the article are for illustrative analysis only and are not buy or sell recommendations.)