The industry suffered a huge loss of 5.6 billion yuan, but CheChe Car Insurance turned a profit.
Did the money from new energy vehicle insurance get pocketed by intermediaries?

(Source: Yushan Guanjin)

On April 2, NASDAQ-listed insurtech platform Cheche Technology (CCG, hereinafter referred to as “Cheche”) released its unaudited financial results for the second half of 2025 and the full year. The data shows that for the full year of 2025, the company’s adjusted net profit was 11.6 million yuan, achieving a turnaround from loss to profit. Of this, the adjusted net profit for the second half reached 22.2 million yuan, up 311.43% quarter-over-quarter compared with -10.5 million yuan in the first half. For the full year, the total gross premium volume reached 27 billion yuan, up 11% year-over-year. Of this, the signed premium for 2025 new energy vehicles was 6.3 billion yuan, up 91.0%.

On March 31, the China Association of Actuaries and China Pacific Insurance Information Technology (China IBIS) just released a set of figures: in 2025, China’s insurance industry underwrote 43.58 million new energy vehicles, corresponding to premium income of 190 billion yuan. However, the industry’s underwriting loss reached 5.6 billion yuan. Although the combined cost ratio decreased by 1.3 percentage points year-over-year, the loss was reduced by only 100 million yuan compared with the 5.7 billion yuan loss in 2024.

On one side is the industry’s massive loss of nearly 6 billion yuan. On the other side is an insurtech platform that was the first to turn a profit. Where did the money go?

2 million new energy vehicle policies, 63 billion yuan in premiums, up 91%

Cheche is not a traditional insurance company; it is an insurtech platform, embedded into the automaker ecosystem as a technology service provider.

Cheche’s 2025 comparison table of traditional auto insurance and new energy vehicle insurance (Unit: 100 million yuan, ten thousand policies)

In 2025, Cheche’s business mix showed a distinct contrast: the number of new energy vehicle insurance policies increased 85.3% year-over-year to 2 million policies, while the number of traditional auto insurance policies decreased 7.0% year-over-year.

Behind this change is a significant difference in gross profit margin. In 2025, Cheche had 2.6 billion yuan in new energy vehicle premiums in the first half of the year and 3.7 billion yuan in the second half, up 42% quarter-over-quarter. The new energy premiums in the second half were 1.1 billion yuan higher than in the first half, and gross profit also rose by 28.8 million yuan—highly consistent with the increase in the second half’s net profit of 22.2 million yuan. The contribution of new energy vehicle insurance business to profitability shows a clear seasonal upsurge in volume. By comparison, the traditional auto insurance market has basically completed reforms, leaving limited room for growth.

From a macro perspective, China’s new energy vehicle ownership has reached 43.97 million, and it is expected to exceed 100 million vehicles by 2030, with penetration above 70%. The company’s decision to fully bet on new energy vehicle insurance is precisely to seize this structural opportunity—by embedding into automaker apps to capture new-car insurance entry points, and building competitive barriers through online issuance rates and AI pricing technology. When traditional auto insurance policies shrink, new energy vehicle insurance, growing at over 85%, becomes the new engine. This also explains why Cheche Technology was able to achieve a turnaround to profit ahead of the industry’s overall losses.

The company’s share in the new energy vehicle insurance market is about 3.3%, which is higher than in 2024, and its growth rate is far above the industry average of 33.8%. Cheche Technology’s founder and CEO Zhang Lei said, “2025 is a crucial turning point for Cheche Technology. This confirms the enormous commercial value of the intelligent connected-vehicle insurance model that combines data-driven approaches with AI empowerment.”

16 automakers cooperate to secure insurance service entry, with an online issuance rate of over 95%

Cheche’s profitability first comes from taking control of the automakers’ core entry point.

As of the end of 2025, the company had already reached total-to-total strategic cooperation with 16 mainstream new energy vehicle companies, connected to products from 80 insurance companies, and deepened ecosystem collaboration with leading automakers. Partner automakers include Xiaomi Auto, Li Auto, NIO, Volkswagen Anhui, Tesla, Xpeng, and other mainstream brands, forming a full lifecycle service closed loop covering new car sales and new insurance, renewal of existing policies, and intelligent claims.

In the era of new energy vehicles, automaker apps have become the most frequent and core service entry point to reach vehicle owners. Cheche provides automakers with end-to-end digital solutions covering pricing, underwriting, claims, and full-lifecycle management. It integrates its self-developed insurance transaction platform in an embedded form into automaker apps, enabling precise insurance touchpoints in key scenarios such as purchasing a car, using the car, maintaining the car, and replacing the car. This “order a car means you insure” model creates a natural traffic advantage. Taking leading new energy brands such as Xiaomi, Tesla, and Li Auto as examples, the platform’s peak monthly new-car issuance exceeds 100,000 units, the online issuance rate remains stable at more than 95%, and the proportion of car owners who self-insure via the app reaches as high as 87%.

In addition, the company also extends its digital and intelligent experience to the traditional fuel vehicle market, promoting insurance digital transformation for some traditional automakers and expanding more diversified sources of revenue.

Industry losses and intermediary profits: a structural mismatch

Returning to the question at the start of the article: why is the industry losing money while Cheche Technology is profitable?

The answer lies in the cost structure of new energy vehicle insurance. In 2025, there were 143 vehicle models in the industry with claim ratios exceeding 100%, an increase of 6 compared with the previous year. High-intensity usage models such as new energy freight trucks and ride-hailing vehicles became the worst-hit areas for losses. These vehicles travel more than 200 kilometers per day on average—5 times the daily average of 40 kilometers for household cars—and their accident rate is 3 times that of household vehicles. However, a large portion of them are insured as household passenger cars. Their premium standards are far lower than those for operating vehicles insurance, creating a “high claims, low premiums” mismatch, which directly raises the industry’s overall claim ratio.

Cheche operates with a light-asset insurance technology platform model and does not directly assume insurance payout risk. Instead, it earns fees by providing technology services to automakers and insurance companies. The key to its profit model lies in—embedding into automaker sales channels and capturing new car insurance entry points—this part of the entire new energy vehicle insurance chain has relatively stable profitability and is not directly hit by fluctuations in claims. In other words, most of the industry’s losses are on the claims side, while the money Cheche Technology earns comes from service fees on the channel side; the two are not on the same part of the chain.

Of course, Cheche is not under zero pressure.

On one hand, revenue growth has continued to slow down. The company’s revenue growth rate dropped sharply from 54.38% in 2022 to 2.30% in the first three quarters of 2024. Although new energy premiums rose 91% in 2025, overall revenue growth still remains below 11%, as the shrinking traditional auto insurance business is offsetting the high growth of new energy insurance.

On the other hand, accounts receivable remain high. As of the end of 2025, the company’s net accounts receivable was about 980 million yuan. Although it had slightly fluctuated from 982 million yuan at the end of 2024, overall it still remained at a high level of nearly 1 billion yuan, accounting for more than 80% of current assets. From a structural perspective, accounts receivable mainly come from insurance companies and new energy vehicle manufacturers, and the payment terms are generally between 30 and 90 days. In its financial report risk warning, the company noted that as the new energy vehicle insurance business expands rapidly, the scale of accounts receivable will increase accordingly. If there are delays in payment from major cooperation partners or worsening credit conditions, it may lead to slower collections and bad debt risk, thereby adversely affecting the company’s cash flow stability and operating performance.

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