Huachuang Securities: The era of electronic and financial integration is coming, focusing on the performance of three types of assets.

Huachuang Securities released a research report stating that "electricity-computing synergy" was mentioned for the first time in the State Council's government work report, and the collaborative development of electricity and computing has risen to the national strategic level. Electricity costs are a core component of data center operating expenses, and the advantage of low electricity prices for green electricity is expected to drive down data center costs. The surge in demand for computing power and data centers has led to further increase in demand for green electricity, which may effectively alleviate the current quantity and price dilemma in the green electricity industry. The report recommends focusing on three investment clues: companies transitioning from the electricity main business to data center layout, integrated energy management service providers with a background in the power grid, and power grid operators expected to benefit under the catalyst of direct connection to green electricity. Huachuang Securities' main points are as follows: Policy and economic factors are driving the collaborative development of "electricity + computing" DRIVE1: High-level setting, policies related to the integration of electricity and computing continue to be introduced. "Electricity-computing synergy" was mentioned for the first time in the government work report, and the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission set the trend for future development. The government work report in March explicitly stated: "Implement new infrastructure projects such as ultra-large-scale intelligent computing clusters and electricity-computing synergy, strengthen national integrated computing power monitoring and dispatch, and support the development of public clouds." "Electricity-computing synergy" was mentioned for the first time in the State Council's government work report, indicating that the collaborative development of electricity and computing has risen to the national strategic level. In February, the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission of the State Council proposed that central enterprises should strengthen investment attraction, actively expand effective investment in computing power, and promote collaborative development of "computing power + electricity". Previous policies required green electricity usage in data centers to exceed 80%. DRIVE2: Green electricity is expected to alleviate the constraint of energy consumption dual control policies on data center growth. Data centers are high-energy-consuming industries facing strict constraints from energy consumption dual control policies, and the introduction of green electricity provides a feasible policy path for data centers to break through traditional energy consumption indicators and meet the growing demand for computing power. DRIVE3: The advantage of low electricity prices for green electricity promotes cost reduction for data centers. Electricity costs are a core component of data center operating expenses, with electricity costs currently accounting for 56.7% of data center operating costs and ranking as the top expenditure item. The low electricity price advantage demonstrated by green electricity provides an effective way to reduce costs for data centers. AI drives explosive demand for data centers, and the acceleration of computing power token overseas drives electricity demand. AI drives rapid expansion of data center scale, with the proportion of intelligent computing power continuously increasing. It is predicted that by 2026, China's total computing power will reach 767 EFlops, with a CAGR of approximately 31% from 2021 to 2026, while the proportion of intelligent computing power will increase from 3% in 2016 to 73% in 2026; the scale of computing power at the eight major hubs of the "East Data West Computing" in China continues to expand. The continuous increase in electricity demand for data centers may lead to local power shortages. China's power situation is relatively favorable, with a relatively loose supply-demand structure, but as the demand for electricity for data centers continues to rise, some regions still face the risk of power shortages. By 2025, the power shortage in high-demand cluster regions represented by the Yangtze River Delta hub is as high as 6,108 billion kilowatt-hours, and the localized power shortage pressure in regions with high demand clusters, including the Yangtze River Delta, continues to increase. Domestic computing power token overseas drives rapid growth in electricity demand. Therefore, the stability of domestic power supply has become a key prerequisite for supporting the expansion of China's computing power scale and maintaining global competitiveness. Green certificate trading and direct connection of green electricity jointly ensure the power supply for data centers. Green certificate trading: Solves the limitation of data centers being unable to procure renewable energy. Direct connection to green electricity: Breaks through the intermediate links of the power grid and achieves on-site integration of new energy sources. Under the policy guidance since the "14th Five-Year Plan", it is explicitly stated that by the end of 2025, the proportion of green electricity in newly built data centers in hub nodes must exceed 80%, and the classification principles covering distributed and centralized power sources, grid and off-grid loads have been established, effectively solving the problem of on-site integration of new energy sources and becoming a key support for the development of electricity-computing integration. Risk Warning Policy progress is slower than expected, data center construction is slower than expected, and downstream green electricity demand fluctuates.