By Doug Young

Solar panel makers are finally seeing signs that the clouds could be lifting from their embattled sector, sparking a stock rally for their volatile shares. Canadian Solar (CSIQ) led off the upbeat news, releasing preliminary results that included better-than-expected first-quarter sales and margins. But perhaps more importantly, other reports said the industry is seeing some of its first sustained price increases after more than 2 years of declines. Those 2 pieces of good news ignited a rally for solar shares, led by Canadian Solar whose stock rose more than 12 percent to a new high not seen for more than a year and a half. Shares of JA Solar (JASO) also rose a healthy 11 percent, while Trina Solar (TSL) was up 7.5 percent. Even embattled LDK (LDK) shared in the gains, rising 8 percent in the rally.

Let's start with Canadian Solar,

Introduction

The data used in the context of this article has been provided by Solarzoom PV Solar Portal, a Chinese market research firm specializing in the domestic solar industry. In one report, deliveries are measured in megawatts (MW), and destination or port of delivery is disclosed. The second report, also available from Solarzoom, in addition to data from the first report, provides pricing per watt based on the declaration at the Chinese customs office. Due to the confidential nature of this information, those details have been omitted. This information is available in monthly premium reports at SolarPVInvestor.

In order to understand the premise of this article, a couple of definitions are required.

Delivery/export - this term describes a condition in which solar modules would clear Chinese customs with the purpose of exportation. This way, a record will be created that discloses the destination and quantity

The solar industry appears to have caught fire these last few weeks. With industry leader First Solar (FSLR) breaking out of its downward spiral in the middle of last year, the remaining companies began to stir toward the end of 2012. A look at the chart below shows how this trend unfolded by observing some of the leading names in the industry.

FSLR data by YCharts

With the largest concern of companies in this space dwelling around the possibility of bankruptcy, the rising trend in stock prices has served as a boon towards ensuring this becomes a less likely scenario. After all, higher stock prices equate to greater capacities to raise equity should the need arise. Late last March, the fall of a giant player found in Suntech Power Holdings (STP) may have marked the end of the industry's extended decline as the Chinese company filed for bankruptcy.

Canadian Solar Inc. (CSIQ) is another troubled solar company that is near financial distress because of the conditions on the solar market. The company is one of the losers in the Jobs Transformation Scheme.

The company has been losing money for the last two years, like its peers. The company's equity has shrunken from $534 million to about $301.58 million. The company's net loss is in an up-trend, it keeps increasing. If the company continues to burn money at the current rate, it will have a negative equity by Q2 2014 - Q3 2014.

As illustrated in Chart 2, the company experienced aggressive shipments of modules growth from Q2 2010 to Q4 2011. The company's shipments of modules rose by 140.6% in that

Suntech (STP) has been stuck in the penny range for quite some time as the company has declared bankruptcy after failing to pay $541 million in convertible debt on March 15. However, there is no clarity on how the bankruptcy will proceed as Suntech factories are still operating. Suntech used to be the largest solar panel maker in the world with more than 10,000 employees. It is difficult for the local government to let the solar producer simply die without taking some action. The stock saw a massive surge in volume and price yesterday due to a rumor about Warren Buffett buying the company. This is one of the most preposterous rumors that I have heard. The reason is that investing in Suntech makes no sense for anyone except the Chinese government. The solar industry is still in massive oversupply and almost every company is making huge losses.

By Anil Nain

President Obama is asking Congress to create a new Energy Security Trust to invest in research that "will protect American families from spikes in gas prices and allow us to run our cars and trucks on electricity or homegrown fuels," the White House reported late last week. The proposal would set aside $2 billion over a decade for research into electric vehicles, biofuels, fuel cells and natural gas. The trust would be funded within the overall FY 2014 budget.

According to the President - and as reported by Bloomberg - "The private sector on its own won't invest in this research because it's too expensive, it's too risky, they can't afford it […] so we've got to support it, and we'll all benefit from it."

Whether or not that is accurate is open for interpretation. According to data from Bloomberg New Energy Finance, overall

Introduction

First Solar (FSLR) is the most valued solar panel company with a market capitalization in excess of 2 billion dollars. However, this thin film player may not hold this position for long in our view. The company's solar technology is under threat from the mainstream crystalline solar technology which accounts for more than 90% of the global solar panel shipments. The cost cuts implemented by the Chinese solar players have far outpaced the cost improvements made by First Solar in the last 5 years. The costs of the lowest cost Chinese companies such as Canadian Solar (CSIQ) has reached 55c/watt compared to >65c/watt cost for First Solar panels. These costs also do not factor in the negative effect of the lower efficiency FSLR thin solar panels. The lower efficiency implies that the Balance of Systems (BOS) costs for FSLR panels are much higher, compared to the crystalline solar

Q4 2012 Earnings Call

March 11, 2013 8:00 am ET

Executives

Ed Job - Director of Investor Relations

Shawn Qu - Chairman, Chief Executive Officer and President

Michael G. Potter - Chief Financial Officer, Senior Vice President and Director

Analysts

Kelly A. Dougherty - Macquarie Research

Satya Kumar - Crédit Suisse AG, Research Division

Nitin Kumar - Nomura Securities Co. Ltd., Research Division

Aaron Chew - Maxim Group LLC, Research Division

Pranab Kumar Sarmah - Daiwa Securities Capital Markets Co. Ltd., Research Division

Timothy Lam - Citigroup Inc, Research Division

Presentation

Operator

Good day, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to your Canadian Solar Fourth Quarter and Fiscal Year 2012 Earnings Call. My name is Bhukandar, I'll be your event manager today. [Operator Instructions] I would like to advise all parties, this conference is being recorded for replay purposes.

And now I would like to hand the conference

Last week, solar stocks surged across the board following news that Warren Buffett had agreed to invest $2.5 billion in a solar plant to be constructed by San Jose-based SunPower (SPWR). Some investors were even lured into the trade on the mistaken assumption that Buffett had actually invested in the solar company as opposed to simply becoming a customer. SunPower rose as much as 45% on the day, with other solar names rising in sympathy. Virtually every name in the solar space experienced quite notable gains, including Trina Solar (TSL), Canadian Solar (CSIQ), Suntech (STP), First Solar (FSLR), Yingli Green Energy (YGE), JA Solar (JASO), LDK Solar and JinkoSolar (JKS).

Many of these companies had already imploded to below $1.00 prior to the recent run-up. The company that faces the greatest challenge is Trina Solar, which is now headed toward a near-term insolvency. After a brief overview of the

Normally, the fourth quarter would be a very busy period for the solar industry. December would see a bit of a slowdown on production, but certainly a high volume of sales would concentrate throughout, with sales generation peaking in November. While the average investor cannot see sale receipts for each company, an alternative exists and it's offered by Chinese research company Solarzoom. Based on Solarzoom data for module and cells shipments from Mainland China, October saw around 889MW in module shipments. This figure included 394MW of shipments completed by US-listed companies, in addition to 10MW of cells sold internationally. October shipments revealed over 200MW exported by a variety of import/export entities, including very small manufacturers.

Recent Chinese government announcements suggest consolidation efforts in overseas markets, which could improve volumes for large players, and reduce or eliminate inconsequential ones from the export tally. Considering the 24% size of the contribution,

GT Advanced Technologies (GTAT) has taken a beating over the past 2 years. From its peak in the high teens per share in mid-2011, it has had a roller-coaster ride of a drop to its current valuation at $2.85 as of the time of this writing. Combing through past articles on GTAT that have been posted here on Seeking Alpha over the past two years has been an enlightening experience because every time there has been a pullback in the price of the stock, there is a slew of articles that come out claiming the recent decline in value has proven that it is finally a steal.

GTAT data by YCharts

A Foreshadowing of the Fundamentals

These views are easy to understand. The market now values this company at less than book value, which is always a statistic that catches my eye. I am assuming this is the

Below you can find their average gains for the month of December for the past 10 years.

(click to enlarge)

As can be seen from the chart

Q3 2012 Results Earnings Call

November 15, 2012 8:00 AM ET

Executives

David Pasquale - Global IR Partners

Dr. Shawn Qu - Chairman and CEO

Michael G. Potter - Senior Vice President and CFO

Ed Job - Director, Investor Relations

Analysts

Kelly Dougherty - Macquarie

Sanjay Shrestha - Lazard Capital Market

Shawn Lockman - Piper Jaffray

Mark Bachman - Avian Securities

Brandon Heiken - Credit Suisse

Presentation

Operator

Good day, ladies and gentlemen. And welcome to the Canadian Solar Third Quarter 2012 Earnings Conference Call. My name is [Dapa], and I’m your operator for today. At this time, all participants are in listen-only. We’ll conduct a question-and-answer session towards the end of the conference. (Operator Instructions)

As a reminder, this call is being recorded for replay purposes and will be ready one hour after the conclusion of this conference call. The telephone number to dial is

We reiterate our bullish stance on First Solar (FSLR) based on its impressive grid integration system, increasing conversion efficiency, high production and module efficiency. Its capacity utilization has considerably increased from 63% to 83% and cost per watt has decreased by $0.05 over the course of one quarter. The company has registered earnings of $1.27, which beats the analysts' estimates by $0.23 in the third quarter of 2012. The United States has imposed heavy duties on Chinese solar imports for the next five years, which will help FSLR to strengthen its market position in North America. The company's decline in average selling price and continuous drive to achieve grid parity are most important determinants for long term investors. The stock is attractive to investors due to its relatively cheap valuations. It is trading at EV/Revenue of 0.63x, at a discount when compared to the industry average of 0.7x. Its expected

By Herman K. Trabish

The churn in utility-scale PV (Photovoltaic) projects was the topic of GTM Research VP Shayle Kann’s conversation, at the U.S. Solar Market Insight conference, with people who know where the investment money is and how developers see it.

Canadian Solar (CSIQ) is “focused on two-megawatt to 30-megawatt projects,” Director Noah Eckert said. After coming in “at mid- to late-stage development” and moving Canadian Solar modules to it, Eckert said, Canadian Solar would sell the finished project to an Independent Power Producer (IPP) “like an Exelon (EXC) or an EON (EONGY.PK) or a NextEra (NEE)” and use the capital to begin the process again.

“We have found a robust number of projects in the market in the last year,” Eckert said. “Our approach has been project by project,” he explained, “unlike the MEMCs (WFR) and First Solars (FSLR) who went in and consumed

Will any solar power stock ever be a money maker? That's what investors in First Solar (FSLR) have been wondering for some time. The only thing that was able to boost First Solar's share value was the Obama administration's threat to slap a tariff on Chinese solar panels. That action, which also helped Canadian Solar (CSIQ), was prompted by allegations that the Chinese government is subsidizing solar panel makers.

Yet as you can see, the official help may not be enough to sustain First Solar's share price, which has been seesawing up and down. Part of the reason for the slide is concerns about the quality of the company's solar panels and rumors that some of them might be a fire hazard. Such rumors caused First Solar, Trina Solar (TSL), Suntech Power Holdings (STP), and JA Solar Holdings (JASO) share prices to fall

Below you can find their average gains for the month of October