S&P 500
7,226.20
+0.01%
Dow Jones
49,494.60
-0.62%
Nasdaq 100
27,685.40
+0.66%
Russell 2000
2,804.78
-0.02%
FTSE 100
10,364.50
0.00%
Nikkei 225
59,260.50
-0.78%

Energy

First Solar Kills Estimates, But Mute on Guidance (FSLR, TAN)

Photo of Douglas A. McIntyre
By Douglas A. McIntyre Updated Published
Follow 24/7 Wall St. on Google
This post may contain links from our sponsors and affiliates, and Flywheel Publishing may receive compensation for actions taken through them.

Solar Panel PicFirst Solar, Inc. (Nasdaq: FSLR) has just given its earnings report.  The solar leader in the U.S. reported its revenues were $525.9 million.  While this is up from $418.2 million in the first quarter of 2009 and up from $267.0 million in the quarter a year ago, this is a substantial win over the $459.12 million estimates from Thomson Reuters.

Net income for the second quarter came to $180.6 million, or $2.11 EPS. This is above the $1.99 EPS a quarter ago and well above the $0.85 a year ago, but the Thomson Reuters estimate was a mere $1.62 EPS per share on a fully diluted basis for the second quarter of fiscal 2008.

Shares closed up 3.3% at $173.55 today, but we have shares trading up above $189.00 in the first after-hours reaction.  Unfortunately, First Solar did not give guidance and said it would offer guidance in the conference call.  Until that data is out, this is still something traders will consider as unfinished business or incomplete data.

Despite no guidance, the magnitude of the outperformance here is enough to have shares of the Claymore/MAC Global Solar Energy (NYSE: TAN) ETF trading up over 2% at $10.35 in the after-hours report.  First Solar is over 10% of that ETF.

JON C. OGG
JULY 30, 2009

Photo of Douglas A. McIntyre
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.

Continue Reading

Jon C. Ogg |

First Solar Shares Defy a Poor Earnings Report

thinkstockFirst Solar Inc. (NASDAQ: FSLR) is out with its earnings report for its third quarter. The report is pretty poor, but…
Douglas A. McIntyre |

First Solar… First Cheer, Then Dump (FSLR)

First Solar, Inc. (NASDAQ: FSLR) is out with earnings today, and there is nothing great and nothing awful to report…
Douglas A. McIntyre |

SunPower Surprise Leads Solar Shares Higher (SPWRA, FSLR, STP, ENER)

SunPower Corp. (NASDAQ: SPWRA) has managed to do what many were not expecting.  It blew the doors off of estimates. …
Jon C. Ogg |

First Solar Margin Pressure Trumps Earnings & Guidance (FSLR)

First Solar, Inc. (NASDAQ: FSLR) looked like a decent report, but there is a sell-the-news reaction taking place in the…
Douglas A. McIntyre |

First Solar Earnings Get Valuation Check (FSLR, TAN, KWT, ENER)

We have long said that this Q3 period was likely to separate the men from the boys in the solar…
Douglas A. McIntyre |

GT Solar Finds Redemption (SOLR)

GT Solar International, Inc. (NASDAQ: SOLR) posted strong earnings and mixed guidance, but shares are recovering handily after the report…
Jon C. Ogg |

Intel Keeps The Momentum Rolling (INTC, AMD, SMH)

Intel Corporation (NASDAQ: INTC) just reported earnings for the first quarter of 2009.  Expectations were high with the hope of…
Jon C. Ogg |

First Solar Earnings Face Headwinds (FSLR)

First Solar Inc. (NASDAQ: FSLR) is getting snubbed in the after-hours after the solar leader reported disappointing earnings.  The company…
Douglas A. McIntyre |

Cisco Rocks Numbers, One Caveat Seen (CSCO)

Cisco Systems Inc. (NASDAQ: CSCO) had a bullish bias going into earnings as far as the options traders were concerned. …

Top Gaining Stocks

Cboe Global Markets
CBOE • Vol: 1,568,143
New Pluto Global
PSKY • Vol: 12,285,993
Seagate Technology
STX • Vol: 7,378,346
Oracle
ORCL • Vol: 26,317,675
Datadog
DDOG • Vol: 6,247,779

Top Losing Stocks

LKQ
LKQ • Vol: 4,367,433
Clorox
CLX • Vol: 13,260,523
Stryker
SYK • Vol: 4,519,455
Mohawk Industries
MHK • Vol: 1,859,865
Amgen
AMGN • Vol: 3,818,618