Cui Dongshu: Fortune Global 500 Auto Companies Steady Increase in Sales Revenue in 2025, China New Energy Vehicle Group Shows Outstanding Performance
The Zhitong Finance App learned that Cui Dongshu, Secretary General of the China Transport Association, said that the total revenue of the Fortune 500 companies this year was about 41.7 trillion US dollars, more than one-third of global GDP, an increase of about 1.8% over last year. The overall performance of the world's major automobile companies was good. The sales revenue of the top 500 automobile companies increased steadily, and the overall performance of major Chinese automobile companies was divided. SAIC Motor, FAW, etc. dropped significantly. China's FAW Group dropped from 129 to 164, Dongfeng Motor dropped from 240 to 291, BAIC Group dropped from 192 to 201, GAC Group dropped from 181 to 252, and Geely Group rose from 185 to 155. It is also normal for Guanghui in Xinjiang to drop beyond the 500th place. China's NEV Group has performed particularly well. The profits of the Ningde Era and BYD have surged recently, resulting in internal distribution.
This time, the entry threshold (minimum sales revenue) increased from US$32.1 billion to US$32.2 billion. The total net profit of all listed companies increased by about 0.4% year over year, to about US$2.98 trillion. The total assets and total net assets of the 500 listed companies reached their highest peak since the establishment of the Fortune 500 list, but the total number of employees employed has declined compared to last year.
Chinese companies have performed well
In terms of numbers, China's Fortune 500 companies are growing extremely rapidly, including 5 companies from Taiwan Province. In 2007, 28 mainland Chinese companies entered the world's top 500, and by 2013, 95 mainland enterprises had entered the world's top 500, which was a golden period for China's rapid economic development; in 2014-2017, China's Fortune 500 companies had relatively stable growth; in 2018, there was a significant increase in the number of Fortune 500 companies; number one in the world in 2021; reaching 145 in 2022, far leading; 142 companies in 2022, 130 in 2025. Withdrew from the selection in a low-key manner.
Meanwhile, the number of US companies in the top 500 was 153 in 2007, and dropped to 139 in 2009. Starting in 2014, the number of US companies in the top 500 in the world dropped back to around 120. According to this year's statistics, there were 138, which is a strong performance.
China is the only unique economic power in the world that continues to develop. Developing countries such as India, Brazil, and Russia are not on the same level as China at all. Their Fortune 500 companies have hardly grown in the past ten years, so I don't think the BRICS concept makes much sense.
Changes in China's top 500 companies over the years
With the development of new energy vehicles in China, the number of China's automobile industry chains entering the world's top 500 has gradually increased. In 2022, BYD will enter the top 500, and in 2023, new automotive parts companies such as Ningde Era and Lixun Precision will enter. In 2024, Chery entered the world's top 500, but at the same time, Xinjiang Guanghui withdrew from the world's top 500, reflecting changes in the industry.
In 2025, Chinese companies such as China and China Airlines kept a lower profile and withdrew from the world's top 500. The vast majority of them were excellent, but only low-key.
Changes in the overall size of the top 500
The wealth of the world's top 500 companies has grown rapidly in recent years. In particular, Chinese companies have performed well. Since 2009, the total sales revenue of China's top 500 companies has continued to grow rapidly, which is better than that of American companies, but recently China's scale was temporarily adjusted due to the lack of participation of major Chinese companies; however, it can be seen that the performance of the world's top 500 companies, such as Japanese companies and German companies, is relatively stable, and even the performance of the top 500 companies such as Germany, France, and the United Kingdom is relatively weak.
The profits of Chinese companies remained high in 2022, mainly due to obvious industrial advantages and declining profits in individual industries such as real estate. Meanwhile, the profits of American companies fluctuated greatly. Trends in other countries diverged, Japanese companies performed moderately, and corporate profits in other countries rebounded markedly. Chinese corporate profits remained high in 2025, and there was relatively little decline.
Changes in the distribution of the top 500 companies
China's top 500 enterprises are mainly in the fields of metallurgy, construction, electronic equipment, aerospace, mining, etc.
America's strengths are health insurance, wholesale and retail, software, consumer goods, etc. In the past, Japan was stronger than China in the automobile and wholesale and retail sectors, and this year they were all surpassed by China.
German cars are similar to China's, but they are better at medicine and medicine.
The industrial restructuring of Chinese enterprises has unique advantages. In particular, the performance of construction real estate is outstanding. As a reference, real estate, construction, and metal smelting companies among large US companies are clearly lagging behind. There are many large companies in IT, life, health, and food-related fields. China is in contrast to this. In particular, in industries closely related to people's lives and health, such as health, food wholesale, insurance-managed medical care, food production, processing, and entertainment, there are companies from the US, Europe, Japan, Brazil, etc., and Chinese companies still have great opportunities.
The differentiation of the profit structure of the world's top 500
China's strong profits come from the banking system. It has excellent profits, which are unmatched by other industries and banks. The Chinese love to save money, so high-profit banks are everywhere.
Not many companies will withdraw from the top 500 in 2025
This was not reflected in the 2024 Top 500 companies in 2025.
In 2025, many Chinese companies also withdrew from the Fortune 500. This is also because Chinese companies are low-key, and at the same time, many mergers and restructuring of enterprises have merged into other companies.
Some Chinese companies are also keeping a low profile, and outstanding superpowerhouse companies such as China Development Bank, China Chemical Group, China Construction Group, Zhengwei International Group, China Development Bank, China Aviation Industry Group, China Shipbuilding Industry Group, China Merchants Group, China Evergrande Group, China Southern Industrial Group, Laibao Group, Tianjin Bussan Group, Everbright Group, Anbang Insurance, China Electronics Technology Group, Hainan Airlines Group, China Huaxin Energy, and China Aerospace Science and Technology Group have not participated in the selection recently.
Specific industry analysis
1. National defense and military industry are excellent
Among the world's top 500 aerospace companies, China has many outstanding enterprises such as China Ordnance Industry Group, China Aerospace Industry Group, China Shipbuilding Industry Group, China Aerospace Science and Technology Group, China Aerospace Science and Technology Group, etc. This has also made Chinese companies and American companies an excellent system among aerospace, military, and defense enterprises in the world. China's system is relatively strong.
2. The public infrastructure and investment are excellent
China has the strongest investment system in the world, and CITI's investment capacity, supported by real estate, is world-leading. The scale of investment in Shenzhen, investment in Guangzhou, investment in Hangzhou, and investment in Guangxi is huge.
China has a strong power grid system. China's National Grid and China Southern Power Grid are all leading in the world. In addition to Chinese power companies such as China Electric Power Group and Huadian Group, the current status of Chinese companies among the world's electricity companies is an extremely outstanding characteristic.
3. Construction real estate companies are excellent
The strongest Chinese companies in the world are construction companies. Due to the huge boom in real estate, the scale of investment is large. The overall profit margins of these real estate companies are relatively low, and the trend of going out of business is obvious.
Despite the sharp rise in housing prices in the early period, the profits of housing enterprises are not fully reflected. This shows that enterprises are not strong in their ability or that their costs are too high. Due to huge investment, it is only possible to support such a large construction system, so debt risk continues to be reflected. Evergrande, Country Garden, and Longhu are all under tremendous pressure.
4. Securities insurance
The securities and insurance industry accounts for the highest proportion of the world's top 500 companies. The performance of Chinese companies is very divided. Out of a total of 57 companies, Chinese companies have 7 seats, and many have gone out of business or been split.
European and American countries are relatively strong in the securities and insurance industry. In particular, they have many insurance systems to ensure the safety of consumers' assets. China's insurance system is also relatively conservative. Among them, Ping An, Life, and the Pacific, especially Ping An of China, are relatively rich in profits.
5. Bank savings industry
China's major banks are highly profitable, and their real estate loan interest rates are also high, which has a good balancing effect on the growth of the real economy.
6. Wholesale and retail industry
China's wholesale and retail industry is performing average due to classification, but companies in Xiamen are still doing well. The supermarket retail business of American commercial enterprises performed well.
Walmart's performance was too strong. JD, Ali, Pinduoduo, etc. performed well. To stimulate consumption, China should also lower housing prices and stimulate the physical retail industry.
7. Mining and oil production
CNPC's oil production and refining companies are extremely large. Both Sinopec and CNPC have a scale of 400 billion US dollars, plus many energy systems such as CNOOC and Yanchang Petroleum. There is a huge gap in the size of European and American oil companies compared to China, but their profits are much better than ours.
China's coal companies are also in a good position in the world. It is worth noting that companies such as BHP Billiton in Australia and Vale in Brazil have good benefits, and they should have the opportunity to acquire them after the benefits come down in the future.
China's energy companies are all less efficient, but their actual operating strength is very good.
8. Electronic and electrical equipment
Electronic products are extremely profitable, with Apple's profit margin reaching 24% and Samsung's profit margin reaching 11%. Meanwhile, Intel's profit margin in the chip industry is -35%, and China's TSMC's profit margin has reached 40%, so overall, consumer electronics have great profit potential.
As the world's largest consumer electronics market, China also has excellent electronics manufacturing capabilities. Lenovo, Huawei, Midea, and Haier are among the world's top 500.
9. Telecommunication field
In the telecommunications sector, US telecom companies have performed well. Many telecom companies are American companies, and there are only three Chinese telecom companies, so their performance is relatively poor.
In the telecommunications sector, the overall sales margin was 8%, and the profit margins of Chinese companies were relatively divided.
10. The performance of Internet companies is average
In the field of software and the Internet, American companies have an absolute advantage. The top five companies are all American companies, and Chinese Internet companies mainly act as online trading platforms, which are similar to Amazon, but the scale of JD and Alibaba is still not comparable to Amazon.
Due to the lack of powerful companies such as Google, there is plenty of room for independent development of the Internet in China.
11. Chinese automobile companies are strong
The overall performance of the world's major automobile companies was good. The sales revenue of the top 500 automobile companies increased steadily, and the overall performance of major Chinese automobile companies was divided. SAIC Motor, FAW, etc. dropped significantly. China's FAW Group dropped from 129 to 164, Dongfeng Motor dropped from 240 to 291, BAIC Group dropped from 192 to 201, GAC Group dropped from 181 to 252, and Geely Group rose from 185 to 155. It is also normal for Guanghui in Xinjiang to drop beyond the 500th place.
China's NEV Group has performed particularly well. The profits of the Ningde Era and BYD have surged recently, resulting in internal distribution.
12. Characteristics of sea, land and air transport enterprises
The performance of Chinese companies in sea, land and air transportation is average; there should be many companies that are implicit world leaders. China's railways and China's aviation should all be world-class.
13. Characteristics of metallurgical steel enterprises
China's metallurgical enterprises have a leading position in the world, and the demand for various minerals and their smelting capacity are strong. In particular, rare earths and other worlds are absolutely dominant.
14. Chinese pharmaceutical companies are weak
Chinese pharmaceutical companies are relatively not in a very high position in the world. Apart from the China Pharmaceutical Group, Guangzhou Pharmaceutical has performed relatively well, and it can be seen that pharmaceutical companies such as the US and Switzerland are relatively strong. Chinese pharmaceutical companies have not achieved a significant improvement after the epidemic.
15. China's consumer goods industry is weak
There are relatively few leading brands in the consumer goods industry in China. Overall, there are relatively few products classified as such, while American products such as Nestle and Pepsi, as well as products such as the United Kingdom, should be said to have a relatively strong overall performance.
16. China's industrial products industry is rich
In the field of industrial products, China's performance is also relatively characteristic of mainly the machinery and construction fields. In particular, the performance of companies such as Chinese construction and conch profiles is a characteristic of this.
17. Strong industries with Chinese characteristics
These outstanding Chinese enterprises have risen rapidly. In particular, the strength of urban investment companies has greatly increased due to the high value of real estate assets, etc.