Short Seller Surprise, Alternative Energy Mixed Bag (CSIQ, CPST, CLNE, ENER, ESLR, FSLR, FCEL, SOLR, HOKU, JASO, SFUN, SPWRA, SPWRB)

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By Douglas A. McIntyre Updated Published
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Solar_panel_picWith oil tanking, many alternative energy stocks and solar stocks have been paying for it.  They were the leveraged winners when oil was running up and now they are paying the price on the way down.  You will see some major increases in the short selling in some of the key stocks, but it is amazing just how mixed the bets are with some seeing real drops in the short interest.  Maybe the notion is out that with suddenly super-low P/E ratios and with many off 75% or more that the worst is behind:

Stock (Ticker)                                      NOV. 28      NOV. 14   CHANGE
Canadian Solar Inc. (CSIQ)                  2,427,370    3,368,857   -27.95%
Capstone Turbine Corp. (CPST)           17,560,127   18,493,021  -5.04%
Clean Energy Fuels Corp. (CLNE)         3,410,178    3,278,222   +4.03%
Energy Conversion Devices (ENER)     12,318,601   11,092,675  +11.05%
Evergreen Solar, Inc. (ESLR)               24,902,180   25,732,337   -3.23%
First Solar, Inc.    (FSLR)                      9,307,012    7,074,475   +31.56%
FuelCell Energy, Inc. (FCEL)                 9,091,358    9,447,180   -3.77%
GT Solar International (SOLR)                2,614,025    2,092,142   +24.94%
Hoku Scientific, Inc. (HOKU)                 2,040,200    2,442,894   -16.48%
JA Solar Holdings, Co. (JASO)            18,283,207   16,661,472  +9.73%
Solarfun Power Holdings Co. (SFUN)     5,003,987    5,249,784   -4.68%
SunPower Corp. (A) (SPWRA)            11,114,809   12,210,305   -8.97%
SunPower Corp. (B) (SPWRB)              3,230,046    1,990,460   +62.28%

Jon C. Ogg
December 10, 2008

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About the Author Douglas A. McIntyre →

Douglas A. McIntyre is the co-founder, chief executive officer and editor in chief of 24/7 Wall St. and 24/7 Tempo. He has held these jobs since 2006.

McIntyre has written thousands of articles for 24/7 Wall St. He is an expert on corporate finance, the automotive industry, media companies and international finance. He has edited articles on national demographics, sports, personal income and travel.

His work has been quoted or mentioned in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Time, The New Yorker, HuffPost USA Today, Business Insider, Yahoo, AOL, MarketWatch, The Atlantic, Bloomberg, New York Post, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, The Guardian and many other major publications. McIntyre has been a guest on CNBC, the BBC and television and radio stations across the country.

A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College, McIntyre also was president of The Harvard Advocate. Founded in 1866, the Advocate is the oldest college publication in the United States.

TheStreet.com, Comps.com and Edgar Online are some of the public companies for which McIntyre served on the board of directors. He was a Vicinity Corporation board member when the company was sold to Microsoft in 2002. He served on the audit committees of some of these companies.

McIntyre has been the CEO of FutureSource, a provider of trading terminals and news to commodities and futures traders. He was president of Switchboard, the online phone directory company. He served as chairman and CEO of On2 Technologies, the video compression company that provided video compression software for Adobe’s Flash. Google bought On2 in 2009.

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