In April, multiple "provincial championships" will take place, boosting local consumption through event-driven economies. These concept stocks are frequently visited by institutional research.

In recent years, provincial city football leagues—represented by the “Scottish Premier League” style “provincial super” (SCL)—have continued to gain momentum in popularity, gradually growing into a national-level sports event IP. This year (2026), the “provincial super” will be kicked off by Zhejiang first. The opening-round matches will officially begin on April 6, followed by city football leagues in Jiangsu, Hubei, Shandong, and Guangdong, which will also get underway in April in sequence.

With events driving momentum, related culture and tourism (culture-travel) markets have also continued to heat up. A recent research report from Guojin Securities noted that with the deepening of the supply-side of service consumption, residents’ consumption demand is expected to be further released, and culture-travel events are among the most typical tracks. Culture-travel events represented by SCL, through a “government-market-society” three-way coordinated model, while improving operational efficiency, have also released vitality in culture-travel consumption and helped clear supply bottlenecks for high-quality culture-travel events.

Benefiting from the provincial super and multiple other events boosting the sector together, the sports industry segment has been active several times recently. Based on market performance statistics over the past nearly 2 weeks, several stocks—including Hongchang Technology, Shuhua Sports, Treader, Huayang Racing, and Xiangyuan New Materials—have led in price gains. Among them, Hongchang Technology and Shuhua Sports rose nearly 43.5% and 37.1%, respectively, over the past nearly 2 weeks. If measured by the number of daily limit-up (涨停) occurrences, stocks such as Shuhua Sports, ST Mingcheng, ZT Sports Industry, and Hongchang Technology have had relatively high counts of limit-ups over the past nearly 2 weeks.

Regarding related concept stocks, when screening for targets related to the sports industry, based on data as of April 3, stocks such as Huali Group, Monalisa, Kairun Shares, S-3 Outdoor, Glacier Cryogenics, Anli Shares, Songsheng Shares, Chuangyuan Shares, Huayang Racing, and Com’Bite, among others, ranked near the top in terms of institutional research survey volume over the past one year. If measured by stock-price trading activity, after excluding ST stocks, companies such as Taimuzi, Shuhua Sports, Co-create Turf, Palm Shares, Lansheng Shares, Jihua Group, Xinxing Shares, among others, had relatively more limit-up occurrences over the past one year.

Note: Sports-industry concept stocks with leading institutional research survey volume over the past one year (data as of April 3)

(Source: Caixin/Finance Times Network)