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Energy

Downgrading First Solar (FSLR, TAN)

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By Douglas A. McIntyre Updated Published
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First Solar, Inc. (NASDAQ: FSLR) is going to be down early this morning after Canaccord Adams decided to downgrade the stock.  The brokerage firm decided to cut the rating to Hold from Buy, and the price target is $180.00.   This could have implications for the solar ETF, Claymore/MAC Global Solar Energy (NYSE: TAN).

The downgrade is based upon targets being maintained at higher than industry levels at a time when others have been having trouble securing a solid business trend.

The company laid out its operational plans at an analyst meeting yesterday and said it is targeting to cut costs by one-third over the next 5-year term.  While the cost is already under $1.00 at $0.93/watt, it wants to target $0.52 to $0.63 per watt over that time frame.  At the same time, it wants to increase solar efficiency to 12.5% from almost 11%.

We still have very thin volume in First Solar trading but shares are now indicated down over $4.00 from the $171.19 close.  First Solar also makes up close to 8% as one of the largest holdings in the Claymore/MAC Global Solar Energy (NYSE: TAN), the solar ETF.  Those shares are actually indicated up marginally but also on very thin volume.

Jon C. Ogg
June 25, 2009

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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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