FIRSTSOLAR - $1,50 pro Wp - Werden die etablierten Solarzellenhersteller unter Druck kommen? (Seite 196)

[Dere]

First Solar, Inc. to Announce 2008 First Quarter Financial Results On Wednesday, April 30, 2008
Prime Newswire
April 21, 2008: 09:00 AM EST

PHOENIX, April 21, 2008 (PRIME NEWSWIRE) -- First Solar, Inc. (Nasdaq:FSLR) will report financial results for the first quarter ended March 29, 2008, on Wednesday, April 30, 2008 at 8:00 a.m. EDT (5:00 a.m. PDT). Investors may also access a live web cast of this conference call on the Investors section of the Company's website at www.firstsolar.com.

An audio replay of the conference call will also be available approximately two hours after the conclusion of the call. The audio replay will remain available until Monday, May 5, 2008 at 11:59 p.m. EDT (8:59 p.m. PDT) and can be accessed by dialing 888-266-2081 if you are calling from within the United States or 703-925-2533 if you are calling from outside the United States and entering access ID number 1227426. A replay of the web cast will be available approximately two hours after the conclusion of the call and remain available for 90 calendar days.

[Dere]

First Solar Now in Its Third Leg Up
by: Andrew Ling posted on: April 17, 2008 | about stocks: FSLR


After being beaten down badly along with the rest of the solar stocks and general market, First Solar (FSLR) has been one of the first major names to bounce back clearly through previous resistance Wednesday in the 280 range to all-time highs. When examining the strength of previous moves this appears to be the middle of the third major rally. The first was from 33 to 123. The second was from 75 to 280. This latest rally started at 140 and judging from the previous two will probably continue to 400, perhaps as soon as the mid-May earnings report.

I'm no expert in techical analysis, but as a full-time investor I have to know the basics. I tend to only use techinal signals when they can be explained through fundamentals. This latest run-up can be justified through higher energy prices, new renewables legislation in the U.S., and a sense of optimism in the general markets.

Etrade recently added some new data to their research section showing that there has been tremendous institutional buying of the shares since last week. For exaple, on 4/15 instituional investors bought 142,377 shares and only sold 23,551. When they start buying/selling they tend to continue to do so for months on end. You simply can't accumulate a million shares all at once.

Also, 94.3% of FSLR's shares are instituionally owned, meaning there is a very small float. This is one of William O'Neil's (the founder of Investor's Business Daily) keys to stockpicking as stocks with a small float can easily skyrocket, as was the case with FSLR in 2007.

[Dere]

Da haben wir sie wieder die 300 er!!!

Bin ja mal gespannt wann wir hier einen Split sehen....

First Solar "buy," target price raised
8:10a.m. - Lazard Capital Markets

NEW YORK, April 16 (newratings.com) - Analysts at Lazard Capital maintain their "buy" rating on First Solar Inc (FSLR), while raising their estimates for the company. The target price has been raised from $250 to $300.

In a research note dated April 15 and published yesterday, the analysts mention that the company is likely to post robust 1Q08 revenues, gross margins and EPS, ahead of the consensus. First Solar’s execution till-date has been impressive and the company has a low-cost profile, the analysts say. The company is likely to provide going forward further visibility into the progress of its cost reduction initiatives and sales contracts, Lazard Capital adds. The EPS estimates for the current and next year have been raised from $2.10 to $2.59 and from $3.25 to $4.50, respectively.

[Kinkikatze]

aus dem yahoo baoard



Einführung + Chart

ttp://www.beststockmarketpro.com/

[JoergP]

Antwort auf Beitrag Nr.: 33.882.585 von meinolf67 am 14.04.08 19:24:38

Interessante Artikel, die Du hier herein gestellt hast! Vielen Dank.

Man braucht schon einige Zeit, um die zu lesen.
Aber es ist hochspannend.
In 1-2 Jahren sollte man an First Solar sehen können, wieviel Tellur tatsächlich weltweit verfügbar ist...

[meinolf67]

http://www.resourceinvestor.com/pebble.asp?relid=41351

[meinolf67]

Materials for Solar Photovoltaic Cells II: Tellurium, Not So Rare After All

By Jack Lifton
20 Mar 2008 at 04:51 PM GMT-04:00

DETRIOT (ResourceInvestor.com) -- In reviewing the English language articles, which discuss the supply and demand of tellurium for manufacturing cadmium telluride photovoltaic solar cells, I noticed a persistent error in the interpretation of U.S. Geological Survey data on tellurium fundamentals and usages, which seems to now pervade all such discussions. I need to emphasize that those who utilize USGS data are reading too little into the numbers, rather than too much.

Based on the discussion following I now believe that there may be enough annual production of tellurium to build and maintain a solar electric power industry, which can become an economically important component of the infrastructure, total supply and accessibility of electric power generation on a stand-alone basis; I now believe that there is much more tellurium produced each year than I thought or than is commonly reported. The difference increases the credible output of tellurium by a factor of between two and four, but the global total annual production may still be less than 500 tonnes a year.

I wonder if the run up, over the last few years, in tellurium prices to today’s $100 a pound for 99.7% tellurium isn’t more due to speculation and, perhaps, hoarding (i.e., advance inventory accumulation-than to a rise in demand as dramatic as the price increase would indicate).

Tellurium is produced mostly, 80%+, as a byproduct of copper smelting and refining, the balance is produced as a byproduct of lead and precious metals, gold, silver, platinum and palladium refining. To the best of my knowledge there is today no primary tellurium mine in operation. I do know however - and it is listed and highlighted in a report I will link to in a few sentences - that there is a site in China, which is considered to be a candidate to be a primary tellurium mine, but I can find nothing about the particular minerals or the extent of the ore body.

To see how the tellurium supply data got confused let’s go back to the very beginning of investor interest in tellurium at the end of the last century, those many, 9 to be exact, years ago.

In 1999, the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), a taxpayer funded operation to carry out scientific studies, commissioned a study entitled “Assessment of Critical Thin Film Resources Tellurium.” Note that the word ‘critical’ in government-speak has come to mean something without which a device or a process cannot be built or done. The NREL had determined that in order for the government to consider doing research on thin film cadmium telluride photovoltaic solar cells as possible alternatives to fossil fuel burning to produce electricity it must first be determined whether or not there was a sufficient, reliable and consistent supply of the critical raw material(s); in this case the material of which the supply base was to be examined was tellurium.

A private company, World industrial Minerals, was chosen by the NREL to do the study, and the result was published, in 1999, and is freely available online here.

The 1999 report is comprehensive. It lists in significant, but popularly accessible, detail the mines, the metals and the recovery processes for tellurium globally and annually. It states, unequivocally, and with mining engineering references, that “the majority of tellurium produced comes from the …anode slimes that accumulate during the electrolytic refining of copper....”

The report then lists 30 companies around the globe that mine or refine tellurium to produce one of three grades:

1.
Tellurium dioxides-sludges and precipitates of variable purity, around 35%;
2.
Commercial grade tellurium: 99.7% purity;
3.
High purity tellurium: 99.9 to 99.9999%.

The report’s author notes that, in 1999, because of [then] current low demand, several of the facilities listed no longer recovered tellurium. The author then points out, “If improving market conditions would warrant, these facilities could again recover tellurium with a minimum amount of effort.”

The report then states that the global average of contained tellurium in one tonne of refined primary copper, is 0.4 pounds, and in one tonne of refined, new, lead is 0.1 pounds. The author then states his belief that, although recovery rates, in 1999, are typically, at best, 39% this recovery rate could increase to 50%, or more, if the demand were there.

Now look at the following tables and the conclusion following them from the report and pay careful attention to the amounts of tellurium “possible to be produced” annually in the U.S. and Chile:

“The combined production potential from copper and lead refining totals 859 metric tons of tellurium for 1997. The actual production of tellurium for 1997 ranges between 200 and 300 metric tons (250 metric tons average). The capacity utilization is estimated to be 29%. It has been indicated that tellurium producers are capable of achieving higher recovery rates if the demand was present. Because of the proprietary nature of the various tellurium recovery processes it is not possible to determine the ultimate recovery efficiencies. With current refining practices for copper and lead coupled with generally consistent yearly metal product output, it is estimated that 859 metric tons to 1,716 metric tonnes of tellurium could be produced per year if demand warranted.”

In 1999, the global production of copper was just over 9 million tonnes; the report’s author estimates that the possible global production of tellurium just from copper, and with a maximum recovery of 50% of the tellurium contained is nearly 800 tonnes per annum.

In 2007, the global production of copper was nearly 16 million tonnes. Thus the possible production of 50% of the contained tellurium would be 800 x 16/9 = 1,416 tonnes! Why is this number so far removed from the 2008 USGS estimate of global tellurium production for 2007 as indicated in the table below, and what are we to make of the remarks that follow the table?

Serious questions arise from the discrepancies which themselves arise from comparing the numbers from the 2008 USGS data with that privately gathered, at the behest of another U.S. government entity, the NREL, and published in 1999.

But first you need to be aware of the fact that the USGS numbers for world totals above are frequently used by those discussing the total supply picture for tellurium.

Here for example are two excerpts from a couple of very recent reports. First of all, incredibly, is Slide 16 from a Power Point presentation entitled “Materials Demand for the Rapidly Expanding Solar Electricity Industry,” published on the Internet in March 2007 by the NREL:

Note for yourselves the global totals for “Refined 2006 MT” of tellurium and the statement of the reserves, and compare those figures with those published by the USGS shown above, in 2008, and with the figures shown by the earlier NREL report published in 1999.

Now here’s some text from a 2006 book, which is a study of the “Future State of the PV Industry-Trends and Technologies”:

Note that it is once again, supposedly, USGS data used to support the supply conclusions. But these conclusions, the ones above, and any of them that are based on the current common interpretation of USGS data may be completely wrong! The explanation for all this misinterpretation is really simple:

Look at the USGS chart above. Note well that it gives data for only 3 of the 18 countries listed in the 1999 NREL report as having production capacity for tellurium from their copper mining. Note also that only a single one, the smallest, Canada, of the top three potential producers identified in 1999, is recorded as having produced any tellurium, and that only two other producers of the potential 15 remaining are identified as actively producing tellurium. The second largest potential producer, the U.S., is shown with no identified production, because the USGS has a policy of not revealing competitively disadvantageous information in return for obtaining the data from American private producers.

In this case since there are very few tellurium producers published data on their output total would enable them to have information about each other, which they do not wish to share. The USGS always identifies such non-reporting with the symbol “W” as it does here. Finally you must note that the total production from 15 of the 18 potential global tellurium producers, including the two largest, Chile and the U.S., which between them had, according to the 1999 NREL report, a total potential production of more than 700 tonnes of tellurium as shown reporting either as W, explained above, or as NA, not available.

I have to say at this point that we must take into account when determining the annual global output of tellurium the fact that some copper production now uses a process for refining, solvent extraction leaching, that eliminates totally the recovery of tellurium from copper concentrate so obtained, and that such contained tellurium once lost is lost permanently. In addition, it may well be that recovery of 50% of contained tellurium is on the high side, but this must be countered with the fact that Canada with a potential, in 1999, for producing tellurium contained in 640,000 tonnes of copper managed to produce, even then, 59 tonnes or 50% of the total potential. Canada actually produced less copper in 2007 (507,000 tonnes) than it did in 1999, but it produced more tellurium, 75 tonnes in 2007 than it did in 1999 with 59 tonnes!

U.S. production of copper was also down in 2007 when compared with 1999, but Chilean production of copper in 2007 was more than double what it was in 1999! Finally, Peruvian copper production in 2007 was two and half times what it was in 1999, and its reported tellurium production increased, but no where near the increase that would have been expected were the 1999 figure, in the 1999 NREL report above, of a potential 17 tonnes at 50% of total potential been correct, even if Peru’s recovery capability were only the traditional maximum of 39% stated in the 1999 article.

My conclusion is that even if we just reduce the 2007 potential 50% production of tellurium contained in copper by half and estimate that only 25% of the potential supply is recovered we then must recognize that the world today is most likely producing at least 500 tonnes per annum of tellurium or four times the commonly stated figure in supply reports!

Before the cadmium telluride PV solar cell enthusiasts begin rejoicing, I must ask some more questions. Even if there is enough tellurium produced to meet the demands of a growing cadmium telluride thin film using segment of the solar electricity industry, isn’t there still a major bottleneck? Isn’t there a serious dearth of capacity to produce the electronic grade tellurium needed by the PV solar cell manufacturing industry, and doesn’t the building of new capacity to produce electronic grade tellurium depend on the availability of skills, equipment and the time it will take to get the purification capacity to match the production capacity hoped for? In addition isn’t it time now for everyone to take a breather and ask the very important question: Are the numbers I have estimated and calculated here today correct?

One set of questions for the investment community. If the demand for tellurium is not immediate, and if the supply, is much more than has been stated, so that the supply exceeds the current demand, then why has the price of tellurium gone up so fast and so far? Isn’t it time for a serious correction, but, if so, where will the investment come from for increasing the capacity to purify tellurium to electronic/solar grade? How much speculation is a necessary component of the total price of tellurium to drive the creation of increased supply and purification capacity?

I admit that in my previous articles on tellurium I misread the USGS data and followed the herd. Now I am either out in front, or I’m a Judas goat. In any case the tellurium supply situation needs to be addressed immediately before any more commitments to cadmium telluride projects are made.

[meinolf67]

weiteres steht unter den Kommentaren:


We can have nice discussions without necessarily agreeing on things. Neither VNP nor FSLR is willing to reveal specific information on their tellurium supply, so any outsider can only speculate, but my speculation is logical and reasonable based on all publically known information.

Tellurium IS scarce on earth. It's on books of geology science so do not try to dispute it. It is true that currently the extraction efficiency of tellurium from copper mines is only 33%, so there is some room for improvement if there is enough economic incentives. But tellurium price already went up almost 30 fold from 4 years ago and we have not seen dramatically ramped up tellurium production yet. Why do you think copper mines will be interested in doing anything to extract more tellurium any time soon, if a 30 fold increase of price is still not incentive enough to them?

According to Professor Martin Green, in average, out of one ton of copper, there exists 100 grams of tellurium, and ultimately 33 grams is extracted using existing technology. One ton of copper is worth $8800, the 33 gram of tellurium, at today's price, is only worth $10, which is nothing compare with the $8800 main stream copper revenue.

Tellurium price will have to go up another 100 fold, bring the tellurium portion up to $1000, compare with $8800 for copper, for there to be some interest to try to get more tellurium out.

But my estimate is if tellurium price triple or quadruple from current price, it will be enough to kill FSLR as a business.

[MontPelerin]

Antwort auf Beitrag Nr.: 33.607.160 von solarauktion am 11.03.08 12:57:23

Ich selbst hatte First nur mal ganz kurz - Bewertung und Tellur haben mir die Affaire versaut...

Aber an das ein oder andere geniale Posting der jüngeren Vergangenheit darf man mal wieder erinnern.

Ein User namens "Solarauktion" hat sich einige Wochen lang in vielen Solarthreads durch besonders viel Weitsicht und Substanz ausgezeichnet.

So, wie auch hier und damit:


gasadi

du bist short - oder? lachen

Auf welcher Grundlage triffst du ansonsten deine Kaufentscheidung? Das ist doch rational nicht mehr nachvollziehbar.

FIRST SOLAR INC. stürzt regelrecht ab - un DU greifst ins fallende Messer??? lachen lachen lachen

Soli

Caprifischer

ich bezeichne dich nur ungern als Deppen - aber deine Aussagen kommen dem sehr nahe.

Schau einfach mal auf den aktuellen kurs. Siehst du einen Boden? ich nicht Zunge rausstrecken lachen lachen

Das hier ist ein Absturz nach allen Regeln der Kunst.

Soli


es geht übrigens weiter bergab...

12:52:45 Geld (bid) 114,37


Boden ist NICHT in Sicht. lachen

Soli


usw., usf.

Nun ja...

[meinolf67]

The Tellurium Supernova Has Erupted
by: Mark Anthony posted on: April 11, 2008 | about stocks: FSLR / VNP

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In my previous article, The Tellurium Supernova, I discussed the rapidly expanding new applications of the extremely rare metal tellurium, and that looming global shortage of telluriumcould threaten the very survival of the red hot solar company, strong>First Solar Inc. (FSLR), which produces solar PV panels based on the CdTe (cadmium telluride) semiconductor material.

The Tellurium Supernova article caused quite some disturbance on the internet. Not every one agrees with me. But I am happy that Mr. Free Market does seem to agree with me. The charts show that tellurium price staged an incredible rally since mid January, raising from 860 yuan to 2100 yuan per kilogram, or US$300 per kilogram, a raise of 2.44 fold in less than three months. Tellurium went from US$10 a kilogram in 2004 to now over US$300. If such a stellar price rally does not indicate a severe global shortage of tellurium, then I don't know what does.

The Tellurium Supernova has erupted!

Does First Solar feel the squeeze of a tellurium shortage? Maybe not. At a conference last November, the CFOclaimed (22:58) "We have identified terawattslevels of tellurium availability." So the ultimate limit to the growth is one terawatts? No! The CEO proudly declared"Are there issues there that limit the ultimate size of the company? We think the answer to that is NO." Wow! I never knew that FSLR can grow with o ultimate limit of size, even though they rely on a metal with extremely limited supply.

FSLR, as well as its dominant raw material supplier, 5N Plus Inc. (VNP), repeatedly reassured people that it is not worried about tellurium availability and they are actively "managing it." But I noticed that it would NEVER divulge anything specific or anything quantitative when it comes to its tellurium supply. In multiple occasions, analysts, including Michael Molnar from Goldman Sachs, explicitly demanded specific and quantitative answers, but got only the vague go-around answers. Why is the company not willing to reveal any data on tellurium?

Fortunately, VNP, the virtually exclusive high purity CdTe and dS supplier to FSLR, is now a publicly traded company and must file regular financial reports, allowing us to dig out some useful information. You can go to Sedar.com and search for "5N Plus" to find all VNP regulatory filings. I think the VNP's Dec. 12, 2007 prospectus document is worth reading through carefully. It discusses a lot of details of the industrial use of high purity tellurium, and its relationship with FSLR. You might also listen to latest conference call. A few important things to note from the prospectus:

1. VNP is the first to enter the market of high purity tellurium metal and compounds. It has years of expertise, large scale production capacity, and business relationship with tellurium sources. It is the world's dominant CdTe supplier and all dTe solar PV manufacturers purchase CdTe from them.

2. VNP is a virtual monopoly in this niche market. The barrier of entry is too high for a second major CdTe supplier, and the market is too narrow to provide enough economic incentive for competitors to enter this small niche market and compete with VNP. FSLR desperately wanted to diversify its CdTe sources but there is just no significant secondary supplier in existance in the world. It refuses to name the secondary supplier. Does it even exist at all? NP already named all of its few potential competitors.

3. It is safe to say SLR gets virtually all of its dTe supply from VNP. VNP has plenty of production capacity, 100 metric tons of CdTe annually, and under contracts with FSLR, it is building a new Germany facility, bringing the annual capacity to 200 metric tons and eventually reaching 350 metric tons a year. Why would VNP expand if FSLR does not continue to heavily depend on VNP for supply?

4. VNP noted rapidly expanding industry demand on tellurium. It mentioned 300 metric tons of start metals per year for thermoelectrics applications (page 21). That number really strikes me. According to USGS, global tellurium supply can not be much more than 200 metric tons per year. Thermoelectrics usage of tellurium wasn't even mentioned a few years ago. Now that market alone consumes 143.4 metric tons of tellurium (48% of the Bi2Te3 thermoelectrics material is tellurium).

So we can pretty accurately estimate FSLR's raw material supply by looking at how much CdTe VNP is selling to FSLR. VNP refused to provide numbers in kilograms, but it gave a price range of $300 to $500 per kilogram during the Q2 conference call, and suggested in Q3 conference call that the price may exceed the top of the range now. So using $500 per kilogram, one can get some reasonable numbers. VNP also revealed that 60% of sales was to FSLR, and 65% to 70%.

Let me list VNP's quarterly sales revenue, as well as cost of goolds sold (in bracket) below. Note their fiscal year 2008 starts on June 1st, 2007. Q3,08 is the quarter ending Feb. 29, 08.

Q3,08 $8.359M ($3.905M) OP. Margin $4.454M

Q2,08 $6.796M ($3.519M) OP. Margin $3.277M

Q1,08 $6.394M ($3.417M) OP. Margin $2.977M

Q4,07 $6.549M ($3.442M) OP. Margin $3.107M

Q3,07 $5.555M ($3.419M) OP. Margin $2.136M

Q2,07 $4.890M ($2.779M) OP. Margin $2.111M

Q1,07 $4.903M ($3.122M) OP. Margin $1.781M

I noticed one curious thing. During the past quarters, even though the sales revenue saw some growth, the growth is not impressive at all. The cost of goods sold saw virtually no growth at all, while the operating profit jumps up rapidly!

Put it in a chart you can see the data more clearly. In the chart, blackis FSLR's rapidly ramped up quarterly production in MWs, red is VNP's cost of goods sold, blue is sales revenue, and green is gross operating profit.

Notice the gigantic contrast between how quickly FSLR's production ramped up, and how there is virtually no increase in VNP's ost of goods sold? Logically, as FSLR ramps up production, it needs to purchase way much more CdTe semiconductor material from VNP. Hence, VNP needs to spend more money to purchase the raw tellurium feedstock, not to mention the unit price of the feedstock raw material must increase dramatically as tellurium price went up a lot.

Something is not right here!

The rapid growth of VNP's gross operating profit, without much increase in the production cost, further enhances the logical wisdom that VNP enjoys an absolute monopoly in this small niche market of high purity CdTe supply, and hence can demand higher unit price as they see fit, while FSLR has nowhere to go but purchase the bulk of their CdTe supply from VNP.

My suspicion is FSLR is not getting all the CdTe it needs for its production. At 3 microns CdTe layer thickness, there's about 15 gramsof CdTe per 2 feet x 4 feet panel of 70 watts. Allowing for some production waste, 0.25 grams/watt CdTeis reasonable. FSLR produced 77 MW in Q4,07, that's a consumption of roughly 19.25 metric tons of CdTe. At over US$500 per kilogram, that's worth $9.625M of purchase from VNP. Add dS, which also came from NP, total purchase should be almost US$11M for the quarter.

VNP's latest quarterly revenue is only $8.359M, and with 65% going to FSLR, that's $5.433M. Split it into $4.8M for CdTe and the rest for CdS, at over $500/kilogram, they sold about 9.6 metric tons of CdTe to FSLR. That's only about HALF of what FSLR would need!

From the VNP's cost point of view, about half of cost is salary, machinery and other fixed costs. Let's say $2M of the $3.905M cost in the quarter is on raw material purchase. SLR's portion takes 65%, or $1.3M, tellurium price during the quarter probably averaged $250/kilogram. So that gives 5.2 metric tons of tellurium, enough to make 9.8 metric tons of CdTe for FSLR, consistent with the above estimate, and inconsistent with FSLR's 19.25 metric tons requirement for quarterly production.

My conclusion, based on the best information available to me and the most logical and reasonable estimate, is that FSLR has already run into a raw material supply shortage due to the global shortage of tellurium. It is either now producing from the raw material inventory, or it probably booked quarterly sales but really could not produce and deliver the quantity of products it sold. Later this year and next, when its new Malaysia factories start production, I really have o idea how it is going to get the tellurium supply it needs.

I contacted SLR investor relations and raised the CdTe supply issues more than a month ago and asked for a clarification, and never got any response. I am hoping that FSLR can come out and clarify how and where it is getting its critical material supply, how much it has secured, and how much they need. Of course, if there really is a shortage, the investor community has every right to demand that the FSLR management disclose the information fully and publicly, as soon as it knows it, as required by the SEC regulations.