From the grassroots to a multimillion-dollar annual salary, BYD's financial leader stands at the pinnacle of the A-share market

By Yang Xuejian

Source / Node Finance

During earnings season, apart from revenue and profit changes of various companies, executive compensation has always been a hot topic of discussion.

Recently, after BYD (002594.SZ) released its 2025 annual report, the pre-tax annual salary of Zhou Yalin, the 49-year-old Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer, reached 10.135 million yuan, immediately becoming the focus of public attention. This is because Zhou Yalin’s annual salary is 2 million yuan higher than that of Wang Chuanfu, the company’s Chairman and President.

According to Node Finance's review of BYD's 2025 annual report, among the 14 senior executives at BYD, six earn salaries in the millions, accounting for over 40%. Li Ke, the company’s Executive Vice President, tops the list with an annual salary of 14.261 million yuan, while Wang Chuanfu, Chairman and President, earns 'only' 8.13 million yuan.

The highest-paid CFO in A-shares has emerged.

Zhou Yalin from BYD earned a compensation package of 10.13 million yuan (excluding incentives), surpassing the previous record held by Zhong Zheng, CFO of Midea Group, who earned 9.46 million yuan. Zhou has become the first CFO in A-shares to achieve a base cash annual salary exceeding 10 million yuan.

As A-share listed companies have recently released their annual reports en masse, apart from Zhou Yalin, several other CFOs in the A-share market exceeded 10 million yuan in pre-tax total compensation in 2025. For instance, He Jie, CFO of SF Holding, received total compensation amounting to 10.262 million yuan (5.441 million yuan from parent company salary + 4.821 million yuan in subsidiary-related wages and benefits). Chen Wenwei, CFO of AMEC, earned a total compensation of 10.8029 million yuan (3.9929 million yuan salary + 6.81 million yuan in incentives).

In comparison, SF Holding achieved revenue of 308.23 billion yuan in 2025, representing an 8.4% year-on-year increase, with net profit attributable to shareholders reaching 11.12 billion yuan, up 9.3% year-on-year. Meanwhile, AMEC reported revenue of 12.385 billion yuan in 2025, growing 36.62% year-on-year, with net profit attributable to shareholders at approximately 2.111 billion yuan, an increase of 30.69% year-on-year.

Public records show that Zhou Yalin, born in 1977, joined BYD Industry immediately after graduating from Jiangxi University of Finance and Economics in 1999. Initially, she worked as a grassroots-level financial accountant at BYD. In 2019, she was appointed as Chief Financial Officer (CFO) and promoted to Senior Vice President in 2021.

From joining BYD in 1999 to being promoted to Senior Vice President and CFO in 2021, Zhou Yalin spent 22 years transforming herself from an ordinary finance employee to a member of the company's top management.

Currently, Zhou Yalin holds core positions such as CFO of BYD Electronics, Director of BYD Semiconductor, Chairman of BYD Auto Finance, and Chairman of BYD Property Insurance. Her annual salary has grown from 1.34 million yuan in 2015 to 10.135 million yuan in 2025, increasing nearly eightfold over a decade.

In the view of Node Finance, Zhou Yalin’s impressive career trajectory of promotions and salary increases, at the age of 49, parallels BYD’s development journey to becoming the global leader in new energy vehicles.

A brief review shows that when Zhou Yalin joined in 1999, BYD's main business was still the manufacturing of rechargeable batteries, primarily targeting mobile phones and consumer electronics. It wasn’t until 2003 that BYD officially entered the automobile manufacturing sector. In 2019, the year Zhou Yalin became CFO, BYD recorded annual revenue of 127.739 billion yuan and sold 451,200 vehicles, including 219,000 new energy vehicles.

In 2021, the year when Zhou Yalin was promoted to Senior Vice President, BYD's annual revenue reached the 210 billion yuan mark, with vehicle sales at 721,300 units, including 603,800 new energy vehicles. At this point, BYD had been the top domestic seller of new energy vehicles for nine consecutive years.

In 2022, as widely known, BYD made a significant announcement to halt the production of fuel-powered vehicles, becoming the world’s first automaker to do so. In 2025, when Zhou Yalin's annual salary exceeded 10 million yuan, BYD's annual revenue had reached 803.965 billion yuan, with 4.6024 million new energy vehicles sold throughout the year, retaining its position as the global market leader in new energy vehicle sales.

The market is highly competitive; CFOs are on the rise.

Focusing on the automotive sector, Node Finance has also noticed that since 2025, automakers' CFOs have increasingly become frequent front-page news sensations.

In early March 2026, Jaguar Land Rover announced that Han Shaoshuai, the former CFO, would take over as the new CEO of its China division.

On February 6, 2026, Toyota suddenly announced that CFO Kenji Kondo would officially assume the role of Toyota CEO on April 1. This marked the first time in Toyota's history that an executive with a finance background became the company's CEO.

Looking further back, on August 1, 2025, Baosi Qi, an executive with a financial background, took office as the President and CEO of BMW Brilliance Automotive Ltd. She previously held roles such as Senior Vice President of Finance at the BMW Group and Treasurer, as well as President and CEO of Financial Services for North America and the United States.

In the view of Node Finance, these three automotive giants—Toyota, BMW, and Jaguar Land Rover—whether handing over the entire business operations to executives with a financial background or assigning financial executives to oversee the Chinese market, indicate that the automotive industry’s priorities are shifting from 'scale expansion' to 'profit-first.' The ability to manage finances effectively matters more than the ability to 'tell a story.'

For instance, Toyota explicitly stated that Kenji Kondo's core mission is to 'lead the frontline in improving profitability,' as Toyota's net profit plummeted by 43% year-on-year in Q3 of the fiscal year 2026 due to uncertainties caused by changes in U.S. tariffs and rising costs of raw materials like chips.

From the current perspective, Toyota’s decision appears to be wise.

Just two weeks after Toyota announced that Kenta Chika would take over as CEO, the sudden change in Iran's situation caused disruptions in Middle East shipping and a spike in costs, precisely demonstrating that Toyota currently needs a CFO who understands cost, risk control, and global capital to take the helm.

However, it is foreseeable that Toyota’s Q4 of fiscal year 2026 will be directly impacted in terms of sales volume, profits, and supply chains, with subsequent financial reports likely to face even more pressure. For Kenta Chika, this presents a mission where he must take on the situation before officially assuming office.

Returning to the Chinese market, whether it’s Jaguar Land Rover, BMW, or BYD, all have a clear understanding of the ongoing fierce competition.

In its earnings report, BYD stated its outlook for the domestic market in 2026, noting that at the market level, ongoing price wars and a highly competitive environment are squeezing automakers' profit margins; on the supply chain side, fluctuations in key raw material prices and stable supply of core components pose new challenges, while geopolitical tensions may exacerbate overseas trade barriers, hindering export growth.

Rather than saying these are challenges faced by BYD, it’s more accurate to describe them as a severe situation confronting all participants in China’s auto market.

BYD’s response measures include enhancing upstream resource supply resilience, continuously optimizing its product brand portfolio, and ensuring steady growth amidst a complex and volatile market environment.

According to Node Finance, as the financial head of this giant company with 800 billion yuan in revenue, and the chief person responsible for ensuring a healthy financial structure, Zhou Yalin, who earns a multi-million-yuan salary, indeed has an even more arduous task ahead.

The entry of auto CFOs into the multi-million-yuan salary era also signifies a shift in the automotive industry from relentless pursuit of scale to focusing on robust financial structures. A multi-million-yuan salary can be seen as a reevaluation of the strategic value of CFOs.

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