Canadian Solar Seeks Capital After Big Stock Gains

The company sold 2.6 million shares of common stock, as well as up to $100 million in convertible notes. Credit Suisse, J.P. Morgan, and Nomura Securities were the joint book-running managers for the common stock offering.

Canadian Solar’s use of proceeds from the stock and convertible notes offerings were for general corporate purposes. Those purposes may include expanding manufacturing capacity, the development of solar power projects and working capital. The company said, “Our management will retain broad discretion over the use of proceeds, and we may ultimately use the proceeds for different purposes than what we currently intend.”

The premarket trading had Canadian Solar shares down as much as 6.8% to $36.45 on more than 250,000 shares. The stock was down only by about 3.8% at $37.60 after 15 minutes of trading. About 1.45 million shares had traded hands at that time, one-third of a full day’s average trading volume.

Canadian Solar shares have traded in a range of $3.12 to $43.60 in the past 52-weeks, and the gross proceeds of close to $200 million from the two offerings compares to a market cap of $1.8 billion.