Shenwan Hongyuan Group Co., Ltd. (SWHY) has released a research report indicating that the latest policy package features broad coverage with notable structural focus, aiming to activate endogenous demand and drive consumption upgrades. The consumer sector now has a solid foundation for recovery, with four key investment themes highlighted: first, the durable goods upgrade chain spanning automotive, used cars, auto aftermarket services, smart home products, and home appliance replacement; second, essential livelihood sectors including the silver economy and infant and child consumer goods, supported by continued policy expansion of supply and distribution channels with strong growth certainty; third, high-growth upgrade tracks covering AI hardware, green products, and health consumption, aligning with the trillion-yuan target and benefiting from coordinated industrial and consumer policy support; and fourth, the domestic trend and offline channel chain encompassing time-honored national brands, county-level retail, and lower-tier market distribution, which stands to gain from channel deepening and urban-rural commercial renovation initiatives.
On August 31, 2026, seven government departments—including the Ministry of Commerce, National Development and Reform Commission, Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, Ministry of Finance, Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, Ministry of Culture and Tourism, and State Administration for Market Regulation—jointly issued the "Implementation Opinions on Promoting the Expansion and Upgrading of Commodity Consumption." Built on the foundation of establishing a robust domestic market and fostering new quality productive forces, the document introduces systematic policy arrangements centered on boosting consumption and expanding domestic demand, charting a clear pathway and setting targets for commodity consumption development during the 15th Five-Year Plan period. As a key vehicle for stimulating consumption and improving people's livelihoods, commodity consumption directly impacts the realization of residents' aspirations for a better life. This document constructs a comprehensive policy framework covering objective setting, key consumption tracks, and supporting guarantee systems, spanning four major segments—durable consumer goods, daily consumer goods, specialty consumption, and upgrade-oriented consumption—while providing implementation support across urban-rural infrastructure, standards systems, brand development, fiscal and financial mechanisms, and market regulation.
The document sets an overall development target for the 15th Five-Year Plan period, aiming for continuous expansion of China's commodity consumption scale, progressive optimization and upgrading of consumption structure, and further release of the advantages of the super-large market. By 2030, total retail sales of consumer goods is targeted to reach approximately 60 trillion yuan. Unlike previous short-term subsidy-based stimulus models, this policy abandons extensive stimulus approaches in favor of long-term thinking centered on institutional optimization, logistics improvement, supply upgrading, and scenario expansion, breaking through consumption bottlenecks from supply, distribution, and demand dimensions. With domestic consumption currently in a phase of endogenous repair and residents' consumption willingness still in need of revival, the document covers four major consumption tracks and pairs them with urban-rural commercial renovation, consumer finance, and market regulation safeguards, establishing a complete consumption promotion policy framework that provides strong support for expanding domestic demand and building a powerful domestic market.
The policy targets four major consumption tracks with precision while layering multiple supporting measures to advance commodity consumption expansion and quality enhancement.
First, durable goods consumption serves as the ballast stone for domestic demand. Durable goods are the key lever for driving domestic demand, with policies focusing on resolving pain points across the automotive, home furnishing, and home appliance value chains. In the automotive sector, measures include optimizing vehicle purchase restrictions, clearing unreasonable consumption limits, improving used car circulation systems, advancing invoice mutual recognition, cultivating aftermarket businesses such as modification, maintenance, and RV camping, establishing a full lifecycle information system for vehicles, improving end-of-life vehicle recycling frameworks, accelerating the deployment of new energy vehicle charging infrastructure, and building consumption clusters along transportation corridors. In home furnishing and appliances, the policy promotes whole-home smart renovations, establishes smart home experience centers, implements trade-in programs, improves the recycling systems for used appliances and furniture, promotes "delivery of new plus collection of old" models, and drives recycling services down to communities and county areas to remove circulation barriers for bulky consumer goods replacement.
Second, quality daily consumption stabilizes the foundational consumer base. Food and beverages, textiles and apparel, and cultural and sporting goods constitute the basic consumption foundation for residents. Policies strengthen agricultural product production-sales linkages, fill gaps in cold chain logistics, support local tea beverage and coffee brands, promote chain brand expansion into county markets, encourage textile and apparel integration with traditional culture, develop designer brands and domestic fashion trends, enrich outdoor sports and IP-derived product supply, and strengthen intellectual property protection. Through quality upgrading, brand cultivation, and channel deepening, these measures aim to activate mass consumption potential and support the growth of local daily-use brands.
Third, livelihood-oriented specialty consumption focuses on the elderly, children, and national brand supply. The policy prioritizes the rigid-demand tracks of "one elderly, one child." In the silver economy, measures drive AI and brain-computer technology to empower elderly-appropriate products, promote exoskeleton robots, smart mattresses, and health monitoring devices, push elderly-appropriate products into supermarkets, communities, and elderly care institutions, and explore certification mechanisms for senior-friendly products. In the infant and child segment, the policy encourages enterprises to develop safe and intelligent infant food, toys, and care equipment, and explores second-hand circulation channels for children's products. Simultaneously, the policy expands domestic trend products, deepens demonstration initiatives for time-honored brands, conducts "premium foreign trade goods China tour" programs to channel high-quality export-oriented products into domestic sales, and leverages the CIIE and Consumer Expo to enrich international premium product supply, achieving diversified and complementary domestic and international consumption supply.
Fourth, high-end upgrade consumption creates incremental markets in green, intelligent, and health sectors. Green, intelligent, and health consumption represent the trillion-yuan incremental tracks that the policy prioritizes. In green consumption, measures promote new energy vehicles, energy-efficient appliances, and green building materials, and improve the green product certification system. In intelligent consumption, the policy establishes AI consumption pilot bases, popularizes smart wearables, smart home products, and service robots, and creates AI consumption experience scenarios. In health consumption, measures optimize approval processes for health foods and foods for special medical purposes, and drive transformation of retail pharmacies into health stations. By leveraging new technologies to empower consumption upgrades, the policy achieves two-way synergy between consumption upgrading and industrial upgrading.
The policy focusing on commodity consumption constitutes a vital component of the "15th Five-Year Plan" consumption promotion system. Subsequent policies are expected to intensify, potentially forming a dual-driven policy framework combining goods and services. Local governments will implement supporting measures tailored to local industrial endowments, including home appliance and vehicle trade-in programs and county-level commercial renovation initiatives. Consumer finance tools will be further enriched, with financial institutions developing tailored credit products for durable goods and upgrade consumption. Circulation-end reforms covering used car system improvements, consumer goods recycling frameworks, and domestic-foreign trade standards alignment will continue to advance. Overall, consumption promotion policies during the 15th Five-Year Plan period are expected to maintain continuity and stability.
Risk warnings: Slower-than-expected macroeconomic growth; policy implementation falling short of targets; intensifying industry competition.