No rainbow without a storm. The past few years have posed significant challenges for East Buy. Initially, the departure of superstar anchor Dong Yuhui was followed by a series of exits from core anchors, including Dun Dun, Ming Ming, Tian Quan, Zhong Can, and Lin Lin. Almost everyone began to doubt East Buy's future, but a financial report unexpectedly transformed public perception of the company.

Recently, East Buy unveiled its latest performance report for the fiscal year 2026. According to the financial data, East Buy achieved a total revenue of 5.7 billion yuan for the year, marking a year-on-year increase of 29.8%. Its net profit attributable to the parent company successfully turned from a loss to a profit, reaching 544 million yuan for the fiscal year, a staggering year-on-year increase of 9377.8%.

It must be said that while the outside world remained fixated on the departure of top anchors like Dong Yuhui from East Buy, Yu Minhong has demonstrated with concrete results that East Buy's profitability has actually strengthened in the absence of these top anchors!

The Financial Data Speaks Volumes

It must be acknowledged that East Buy's financial report is indeed remarkable, even surpassing many expectations. Experience, it seems, carries significant weight. Teacher Yu Minhong indeed possesses some strategic acumen. East Buy's financial report contains three surprising elements that exceeded many people's expectations.

The first surprise: East Buy has effectively silenced all skeptics and critics. This fiscal year 2026 annual report showcases an astonishing 9377.8% increase in net profit. In just one year, Yu Minhong led East Buy from a net profit of just over 6 million yuan in the previous fiscal year to a soaring 544 million yuan.

Despite the departure of Dong Yuhui and several core anchors, East Buy not only avoided collapse due to the loss of these key figures but also witnessed a significant boost in its profitability. This indirectly underscores one point: Teacher Yu Minhong's strategy of 'de-anchorization' has achieved a temporary triumph.

The second surprise: East Buy's self-operated products now account for more than half of its revenue, completely eliminating its reliance on the traffic generated by top anchors. According to the financial data, East Buy's total GMV for the fiscal year 2026 reached 10.2 billion yuan, with self-operated products contributing 5.4 billion yuan, accounting for over 52.6%.

In the past, East Buy relied entirely on the traffic model driven by top anchors for product sales. Now, the success of East Buy's self-operated products signifies that they can achieve a brand retail business without being held hostage by the traffic of a single top anchor.

The third surprise: East Buy's supply chain model has essentially been established. In the second half of the fiscal year, when East Buy lacked the support of top internet celebrity anchors, its revenue increased by 53.7% year-on-year, and its net profit increased by 196.8%.

In the latter half of the fiscal year, the GMV contribution of East Buy's self-operated products further increased, with high-margin self-operated goods becoming the core growth engine, directly driving more significant improvements in profitability. These data attest that East Buy's transformation strategy of heavily investing in the supply chain has been successful and that it now possesses sufficient self-sustaining capabilities.

Rebuilding the Moat

For the live-streaming e-commerce sector, whether it was Wei Ya, Li Jiaqi, Xin Youzhi, or Crazy Xiaoyangge in the past, all relied heavily on a single superstar anchor. Without the support of these online celebrities, their live-streaming e-commerce businesses ultimately struggled to survive. However, after losing superstar anchors like Dong Yuhui, East Buy not only avoided collapse but also witnessed its competitive moat widen.

Moat One: East Buy has significantly enhanced its product barriers by creating thousands of self-operated hit products. East Buy has currently launched a total of 1,009 self-operated products across multiple categories, including fresh food, nutritional supplements, and home textiles.

Among these self-operated products, many, such as fine-stewed bird's nest and collagen peptides, have become bestsellers. This indirectly proves that East Buy now possesses the operational capability to create 'phenomenal hit products' without relying on the personal charm of top anchors.

Moat Two: In the past, East Buy relied heavily on superstar anchors like Dong Yuhui and was also extremely dependent on a single e-commerce channel like Douyin live-streaming. However, now East Buy is breaking free from this single dependency on the Douyin platform through an omnichannel layout.

Currently, East Buy has created a series of matrix accounts on the Douyin platform while also expanding its presence on other e-commerce platforms like WeChat Channels and Taobao. Moreover, the number of paid members on East Buy's proprietary APP has surpassed a historical high of 353,000. At the same time, East Buy's offline stores and vending machines are also being rolled out at an accelerated pace, successfully achieving an omnichannel ecosystem that combines online and offline presence.

Moat Three: An extremely rigorous supply chain system. East Buy has always been meticulous in product selection, even investing tens of millions of yuan annually in product testing and adhering to industry-leading 'clean formula' standards. This meticulous approach to product selection has indeed led to increased supply chain costs for East Buy.

However, this auditable and traceable supply chain system has now become East Buy's most scarce compliance asset and competitive moat. Especially in today's increasingly stringent live-streaming e-commerce environment, this rigorous supply chain system has made East Buy's competitiveness even stronger.

Dong Yuhui Departs with Traffic, While Yu Minhong Crafts a Profit-Generating Engine

Initially, Dong Yuhui's departure was a significant blow to East Buy. Without the traffic generated by this superstar anchor, many believed that East Buy might be driven to collapse by Yu Minhong. However, the release of East Buy's fiscal year 2026 financial report once again validated the correctness of Yu Minhong's strategy.

Yu Minhong's Resolute 'De-IP-ization': By divesting top-tier online celebrity anchors like Dong Yuhui, East Buy initially faced a significant traffic vacuum and public opinion backlash. Nevertheless, Yu Minhong remained steadfast in implementing his 'de-top-anchor' strategy.

It was precisely this strategy that allowed East Buy to redirect more resources, capital, and manpower away from traffic generation and towards the research and development of self-operated products. This determination to 'scrape the poison off the bone' became the key factor in East Buy's transformation from a live-streaming celebrity company to a consumer brand.

The Divergence of Two Different Models: Initially, East Buy followed a typical 'person-driven sales' MCN route, which relied heavily on top-tier online celebrity anchors and platform traffic support. Realizing the drawbacks of this approach, Yu Minhong decided to lead East Buy towards another model, namely a 'product-driven' retail route.

Now, Dong Yuhui, along with Hui Tong Xing, is following the original 'person-driven sales' MCN route of East Buy. This route relies heavily on Dong Yuhui himself, and once his online celebrity traffic declines, it will be a fatal blow to Hui Tong Xing. In contrast, East Buy competes based on the depth of its supply chain and product repurchase rates. These two different live-streaming e-commerce models have now completely diverged.

The Long-Termism of Heavy-Asset Retail: For East Buy, from building its own supply chain to establishing warehouses and then to deploying offline stores, these are all heavy-asset investments. Transitioning from a 'person-driven sales' MCN route to a 'product-driven' retail route is not an easy transformation.

Nowadays, East Buy obviously does not blindly pursue explosive traffic in live-streaming rooms but instead aims to fight a protracted war across cycles using retail logic. Yu Minhong is clearly mentally prepared for this.

The Revaluation of East Buy

The release of the fiscal year 2026 financial report has allowed the capital market to recognize the success of East Buy's second retail model and has also led to a new revaluation of the company.

The Confidence of a Cash Cow: From East Buy's fiscal year 2026 financial data, it holds 5.8 billion yuan in monetary funds, indicating a very strong operating cash flow. This sufficient cash flow gives East Buy even greater confidence to continue investing in the construction of its product supply chain, thereby further widening its competitive moat.

Valuation Reconstruction from a 'Traffic Stock' to a 'Consumer Stock': In the past, East Buy was a high-risk live-streaming e-commerce MCN institution, with the risk primarily stemming from top-tier online celebrity anchors. Once these top anchors left, it would be a huge blow to East Buy. This was evident from the impact of Dong Yuhui's departure on East Buy's stock price fluctuations in the past.

However, now East Buy's membership system is gradually taking shape, and the proportion of self-operated GMV has also exceeded half. Its reliance on top-tier online celebrity anchors is comprehensively declining. In other words, East Buy is now becoming a retail brand with stable repurchase rates and anti-cycle capabilities, and its valuation system will also shift from a 'traffic stock' to a 'consumer stock'.

The Imagination Space for the Second Growth Curve is Gradually Opening Up: Nowadays, East Buy's live-streaming matrix is still fully expanding its layout. However, with the comprehensive rollout of East Buy's offline channels and the continuous improvement of its self-operated product matrix, East Buy has constructed a second growth curve centered around family-wide consumer scenarios.

Currently, live-streaming e-commerce is shifting from traffic dividends to quality deep cultivation, and consumers are more willing to pay for 'trust' and 'quality'. As long as East Buy can continue to uphold 'high-quality and cost-effective' product standards, the long-term value of this second growth curve will far exceed that of simple live-streaming sales.