The stock price has shrunk by 60%! The "first stock of humanoid robots" has its target price downgraded by Bank of America

Ask AI · What market dynamics are reflected by the investment-banking target price disagreements?

After the disclosure of the 2025 financial reports, “the first humanoid robot stock”—UBTECH(09880.HK)—quickly became the subject of rapid re-pricing by sell-side institutions.

In just two days, Citi, JPMorgan Chase, and Bank of America Securities issued target price adjustments with different directions, prompting the market to re-examine the company’s position and valuation range in the embodied intelligence track.

01

Wall Street investment banks adjust target prices

On April 2, Citi raised UBTECH’s target price from HKD 155 to HKD 190, an increase of about 22.6%, and maintained a “Buy” rating.

Compared with the judgment that had remained unchanged for the previous few months, this adjustment came quite quickly, with the key variable being the new guidance from UBTECH management on its shipment cadence.

The company raised its 2026 shipment target for its Walker S-series humanoid robots from the prior 2,000–3,000 units to 5,000 units, and also provided a target gross profit margin range of 43%–45%.

This combination suggests that the company is not only aiming to sell more, but also hopes to maintain a relatively high level of profitability while ramping up volume.

On this basis, Citi raised its revenue forecasts for UBTECH for 2026 and 2027 by 36% and 52%, respectively.

In its report, Citi analyst Jamie Wang and others said that UBTECH management is confident in achieving large-scale commercialization of humanoid robots in 2026.

In addition, UBTECH plans to launch the next-generation industrial humanoid robot Walker S3 in the second quarter of this year; compared with the S2 version, its weight will be reduced by about 15%, and costs will be further compressed.

In fact, on April 1, Citi had already given a positive assessment of UBTECH’s 2025 performance.

Citi said that UBTECH’s gross margin in 2025 was 37.7%, higher than its forecast of 30.1% and the market’s forecast of 31.3%.

At the same time, Citi pointed out that UBTECH’s humanoid robot revenue in 2025 was RMB 820 million, which is 61% higher than its prior estimate of RMB 508 million; unit sales were 1,079 units, also significantly higher than its prior estimate of 725 units.

The rapid lift in the target price indicates that Citi is more optimistic about UBTECH’s business outlook.

Unlike Citi’s major upward adjustment, JPMorgan’s stance is steadier. On April 2, the bank maintained a “Overweight” rating for UBTECH, with a target price of HKD 169.

On January 12, JPMorgan raised UBTECH’s target price from HKD 154 to HKD 169, mainly reflecting an adjustment to its expectation that UBTECH’s 2027 price-to-sales ratio would rise from 12x to 13x.

By contrast, Bank of America’s contrarian move stands out even more.

Of course, Bank of America also recognized UBTECH’s 2025 performance, saying that its revenue growth in the second half of 2025 was 3 percentage points higher than the bank’s forecast.

Additionally, the bank noted that UBTECH’s gross margin was higher than its expectation of 30.5%, and the net loss was smaller than its forecast of RMB 434 million.

Considering UBTECH’s performance in the second half of 2025, Bank of America raised its sales forecasts for the company for 2026 and 2027 by 21% and 5%, respectively, and increased its gross margin forecast by 5 to 6 percentage points.

Bank of America also expects UBTECH’s net loss in 2026 to narrow to RMB 241 million. Even so, the bank still lowered UBTECH’s target price from HKD 187 to HKD 160, a reduction of 14.4%.

As early as the end of October 2025, Bank of America was the first to give UBTECH a “Buy” rating with a target price of HKD 187, implying about 34% upside.

At that time, Bank of America Securities predicted that UBTECH’s total revenue during the period from 2025 to 2028 would achieve a 57% compound annual growth rate, and would reach breakeven by 2028.

Bank of America’s current contrarian move may have something to do with UBTECH’s stock price performance.

On the morning of April 2, UBTECH’s share price rose by nearly 5% at one point during intraday trading, but then fell back; it closed at HKD 102.1. Its total market capitalization was HKD 51.397 billion, and the share price had cumulatively declined by about 19% year-to-date.

Compared with this latest share price, the share price has already fallen by more than 60% from its highest closing price since listing of HKD 257 on March 18, 2024, and also declined by about 35% from the interim high of HKD 157.7 on October 2, 2025.

During the period of share price fluctuations, UBTECH recorded its lowest closing price since listing at HKD 42.55 on January 13, 2025, down 52.72% from the IPO offering price of HKD 90.

Overall, the target price ranges provided by the three Wall Street investment banks are still clearly higher than the current share price, ranging from HKD 160 to HKD 190.

02

Industrial humanoid robot sales exceed 1,000 units

On the evening of March 31, UBTECH released its results for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2025.

From the financial data, UBTECH delivered a solid performance in 2025. Full-year revenue was approximately RMB 2.001 billion, up 53.3% year over year.

Among them, revenue from full-size embodied intelligent humanoid robot products(, which are non-remote-controlled and non-toys, with height above 160cm) and solutions was about RMB 821 million, soaring 2203.7% year over year, with sales of 1,079 units.

Revenue from non-embodied intelligent humanoid robot products(, which include remote-controlled, pre-programmed, and toy versions, with height below 160cm) and solutions was RMB 47.963 million, up 15.3% year over year, with sales of 12,759 units.

Although industrial humanoid robot sales were only about 1,000 units, they contributed about 41% of UBTECH’s total revenue in 2025, making it the company’s largest revenue source.

The significance of this change is that UBTECH’s revenue structure has shifted to being centered on industrial humanoid robots, rather than previously being dominated by educational robots and consumer-grade robots.

During the earnings call, UBTECH stated that it has become the world’s first humanoid robot company with revenue exceeding RMB 2 billion, and that its 2025 revenue ranked first globally among humanoid robot companies.

The financial report shows that in 2025, UBTECH’s gross profit was about RMB 754 million, up 101.6% from the prior year; gross margin for the same period was 37.7%, up 9 percentage points from the prior year.

Among them, gross profit from full-size embodied intelligent humanoid robot products and solutions was RMB 448 million, up 1568.1% year over year, with a gross margin of 54.6%.

As the company’s overall gross margin increased, losses were also narrowing. UBTECH’s net loss in 2025 was about RMB 790 million, down 31.9% year over year.

In its financial report, UBTECH explained that the reduction in net loss was mainly due to increases in revenue and gross profit, as well as the continued decline in expense ratios.

But if you further break it down, you can see that the company is still in a typical stage of heavy R&D.

In 2025, UBTECH’s research and development expenditure was RMB 507 million, accounting for 25.4% of revenue. Although the proportion declined compared with the previous year, the absolute figure continued to grow.

Among them, R&D investment in full-size embodied intelligent humanoid robots exceeded RMB 270 million. In addition, as of 2025, UBTECH’s cumulative R&D investment over the past four years has reached RMB 1.9 billion.

Meanwhile, as of the end of 2025, the company had 2,550 employees, with payroll costs of about RMB 915 million, and per-capita costs of nearly RMB 360,000.

Since launching Walker S at the end of 2023, UBTECH has focused on advancing the rollout and application of industrial humanoid robots.

From S1 to S2, and to the soon-to-be-released S3, UBTECH’s Walker series products are continuously improving performance through ongoing iterations.

For example, Walker S2 released in July 2025 stands 1.76 meters tall, with 52 degrees of freedom and industrial-grade dexterous hands.

This humanoid robot can perform complex high-difficulty actions such as stable handling and lifting of 15kg loads across a full 0–1.8 meter space, flexible ground contact, extreme squatting, long-distance grasping, and ±162° flexible waist rotation—at a higher level of intelligence.

As product performance improves, the company’s production capacity and orders are also expanding in parallel.

By the end of 2025, UBTECH’s annualized production capacity for full-size humanoid robots exceeded 6,000 units, and orders continued to lead the global embodied intelligent humanoid robot industry.

In November 2025, the first batch of several hundred Walker S2 humanoid robots officially began mass production and delivery, with plans to roll them out in phases into industrial frontline applications, covering areas such as automotive manufacturing, intelligent manufacturing, and smart logistics.

In addition, the company is also strengthening its capabilities through industrial layout.

In mid-March, UBTECH officially became the controlling shareholder of A-share listed company Fenglong Stock(002931.SZ).

UBTECH’s RMB 1.665 billion acquisition of Fenglong Stock was interpreted by the market as extending upstream in the supply chain, which helps control costs and improve delivery capabilities.

03

Conclusion

Since its establishment in 2012, UBTECH’s positioning has adjusted as its product forms have evolved.

In its early years, the company introduced the small robot Alpha 1S, which was more often regarded by the market as an intelligent toy; therefore, UBTECH was treated as a company that sells toy hardware.

However, this label did not restrict UBTECH’s long-term development direction. Founder Zhou Jian’s goal has always been clear: to create truly humanoid robots.

Since it released the first-generation Walker robot in 2018, UBTECH has continued to move toward higher technical thresholds.

Now that Walker S3 is about to be released, product iteration has entered a new stage.

As industrial humanoid robots scale up and become the biggest source of revenue, the company can finally shed the label of a consumer company.

As more UBTECH robots “go to work” in factories, the company’s business logic and growth curve are being redefined.