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Meituan · 3690 · HKEX

Meituan runs China's largest local-services platform, linking consumers and merchants across food delivery, instant retail, in-store dining, and hotel and travel booking, earning delivery fees, merchant commissions, and online-marketing revenue.

$10.32
Share price 52-wk $8.12–13.66
$62.7B
Market cap ~6.1B shares
$50.7B
FY2025 revenue +8.1% YoY
150M+
Daily delivery orders July 2025 peak
Founded 2010, listed on the HKEX in September 2018 (as MEITUAN-W). Across the 2026 window on file the shares slid from $13.40 in January to a June low of $8.20 as the delivery price war erased profits, closing recently at $10.32 — about a quarter below where they began the year and roughly 35% under the ~$13.66 analyst consensus target.
2 · The tension

A subsidy war flipped Meituan from record profit to a full-year loss

  • The attackers. In February 2025 JD.com launched JD Food Delivery and Alibaba rebranded Ele.me as Taobao Instant Commerce; across 2025 the three platforms spent an estimated $11B on subsidies and marketing to buy into on-demand delivery.
  • The damage. Core Local Commerce — Meituan's profit engine — swung from a +21.0% operating margin in Q1 2025 to a -20.9% loss trough in Q3, as the company poured incentives into defending share.
  • The recovery. By Q1 2026 the segment margin had recovered to -3.2% as subsidies moderated; management pins the reversal on intensified industry competition, not lost demand — revenue kept growing throughout.
Share was defended; profitability became the shock absorber.
3 · The money

Revenue still grew 8%, but every profit line went negative in 2025

$50.7B
FY2025 revenue +8.1% YoY
-$3.3B
Net loss FY2025 vs +$5.0B in 2024
-$3.8B
Free cash flow vs +$6.4B in 2024
$23.2B
Cash & investments net-cash balance sheet

The war did not dent the top line — revenue rose to $50.7B — but it erased the bottom one: net income swung roughly $8.2B, from a $5.0B profit to a $3.3B loss, and free cash flow flipped from +$6.4B to -$3.8B. What makes the loss survivable is the balance sheet: $14.8B of cash plus $8.4B of treasury investments, and a net-cash position, buy Meituan years of firepower to outlast the fight.

4 · The moat, line by line

The moat holds where Meituan owns the delivery network, and frays where it doesn't

  • Strong core. Food delivery (~65–70% share, third-party estimates) and instant retail rest on Meituan's proprietary rider network and merchant density — on-demand orders topped 150M a day in July 2025, above the 100M IPO-era target. Rivals can subsidise volume but not quickly replicate the network.
  • Fraying flank. In-store services — restaurant deals and vouchers, Meituan's highest-margin line — is its most exposed: ByteDance's Douyin turns short-video traffic into local-services transactions without owning delivery, and has taken share.
  • Edges tested. Meituan lost the community group-buying war to Pinduoduo and discontinued Meituan Select; overseas, Keeta is a well-funded challenger to Delivery Hero's talabat in the Gulf and Brazil — not yet a proven franchise.
A category-specific moat — durable where Meituan owns fulfilment, contestable where the fight is for traffic.
5 · The balance

Share intact, profits sacrificed — and the market is split on what comes next

  • The bull case. Structural leadership held through the assault (~70% food-delivery share by third-party accounts), the balance sheet carries ~$23.2B in cash and investments, and consensus expects a swing back to profit — 2027 EPS is pegged near $0.57 against an expected loss in 2026.
  • The bear case. A single quarter's -20.9% margin trough shows how fast rivals who can fund losses from other profit pools can reprice the business; the Q1 2026 truce is an assumption, not a settlement.
  • The market's read. Shares sit at $10.32, about 25% off January's $13.40 and near a June low of $8.20 — yet the analyst consensus 12-month target of ~$13.66 says the Street is betting on the recovery.

Watchlist to re-rate: Whether the subsidy truce holds or Alibaba and JD re-escalate; Douyin's continued encroachment on in-store services; and any regulatory move to defuse the delivery price war.