Gasgoo Munich-Unitree Robotics rallied sharply after the open on Nov. 9, at one point jumping more than 15% to touch 759.99 yuan — pushing its market cap back above 300 billion yuan. By 10:50 a.m., the advance had cooled to around 10%, leaving the stock near 722 yuan and its valuation at roughly 292 billion yuan.
Image source: East Money screenshot
The surge was a sector-wide bet on physical AI. Humanoid-robot stocks rallied across the board, with Swancor Advanced Materials and Xiangming Intelligent locking at the 20% daily limit, and Koyo Bearings and Watpower hitting the 10% cap. The rally wasn't driven by the broader market.
Two catalysts are at play. On Nov. 4, Apple open-sourced HALO, a robot autonomy control system — and the real-world tests ran on Unitree's G1, averaging a 91% success rate on individual tasks. That immediately grabbed the market's attention. At the same time, news that PetroChina and Unitree were forming a joint venture, disclosed on Nov. 4, gained traction in early trading.
Even so, Unitree still trades at a dynamic price-to-earnings ratio north of 500x.
Unitree's third-quarter report paints a mixed picture. Revenue for the first nine months climbed 55.7% to 1.817 billion yuan, while net income surged 270.5% to 387 million yuan. Yet that explosive profit growth largely rests on a depressed base from share-based compensation charges a year earlier. Strip out those one-offs, and net profit actually fell 18.8% to 349 million yuan.
In Q3 alone, net profit excluding non-recurring items slipped to 105 million yuan — down roughly 17% from a year earlier.
For the nine-month period, Unitree's gross margin came in around 54% — a 5.7-percentage-point retreat from a year ago. Selling expenses surged 202%, and R&D spending climbed 191%. Between shrinking margins and heavier spending, the squeeze on profitability is real.
