Rationale? I'm still bitter from that NEWL scam someone pushed on here. Didn't do enough DD, but thankfully only put a very small amount into it speculatively. Re: SLTD, I know they are acquiring MD Energy, and current market cap is $90M. What's our projected future conservative/aggressive outlook here in terms of revenue growth and opex/capex going forward, in your opinion? Gonna do some DD on my own now.
Best,
Steiner
Best,
Steiner
I am an engineer and I sell solar..... Don't buy solar manufacturing companies they are not making money. I looked at their website and saw nothing impressive. A big cost is the installation cost..... A better solar model design is faster to install thus making it less expensive to the buyer thus a better price. Not a stock you can buy but look at tenK solar.....great design and easy to install. Their panel is designed to be wired in series and in parallel thus more production. Also they have a reflector designed with 3m which gives it about 18% more production. Also federal tax credit is scheduled to expire in 2016. Lastly even bigger players in the market are not doing well...look at Solarworld been around since 1977 and they carry a ton of debt
For such a bullish industry with so much potential, it is tough to find good long-term investments in Solar. On the manufacturing end it is really fragmented. Unless you get a big breakthrough in terms of PV efficiency you really have no edge over the other manufacturers and you've now got governments/private sector all over the world investing tons of $ into production. China is going to produce 50gigs alone next year.
I like how integrated SolarCity is but at the end of the day there are tons of small installation companies that can compete with them with far less in soft costs. I know someone who owns an installation company and he can get panels direct from manufacturers at like 5% markup. What happens in 5 years when people understand solar much better and grid parity is more widespread? You'll probably just be able to get the PV panels from Home Depot for less then contract the work out to a local installation company. Not sure how SolarCity thrives in an environment like that.
They're going to ramp up production of their own panels at that new plant in Buffalo but can they really scale what basically amounts to residential construction?
Just don't see a national residential solar installer really succeeding when smaller local companies can do it better and cheaper.
Had this one for over a month as it sat in its base while holding the 200 day mvg avg, and consolidating its move up off the lows mid March. Stopped out a few weeks ago after many false attempts at breaking out higher . I see no rush to revisit this one now, , probably will trade sideways for a little while with 4 and 4.25 providing resistance on the upside Imo
Yeah I just don't see anything on the manufacturing end being more than a gamble. China has cornered most of that market, a lot is starting to move to Malaysia, Taiwan etc now too.
One thing I will say is if SolarCity can make affordable energy storage that they could do some type of bundle pricing plan and allow them to take a bigger share of the installation market (atleast at the high end) but that is a ways off. Their market cap is low enough to wait it out though.
If you think the solar industry is going to take off...which it is there are two main components now.....the panels and the inverters. Eventually batteries will be the next big breakthrough. Elon Musk has a goal for a battery that is $3-5,000 and the size of a microwave. Customers are calling looking to install solar and have this battery as part of their design but it is not out yet. What they can do is install a solar array and add the batteries later. It is as simple as plugging the batteries into the system if it is designed properly initially. To do that there is only one inverter that works: Solar Edge.
There product is great and the stock just went public in 2015. Started in the low $20's and went up to $40 and now is back to low $20's. Check it out. I do know their product is very good and it can be used with any solar panel. Ibought some of their stock in the low $20's but I am an engineer not a stock picker.
One other kind of interesting note. I was asked to speak at a university in town to a class of students. The goal was to see where we are and where we are going. The big game changer I proposed to the students was not new technology in solar panels but battery storage. (right now using current solar technology if we covered just 1/3 of the land we are currently paying farmers not to farm we could produce all of the power the United States needs). If we have an affordable way to store it that will be a huge game changer. I told them I would not have predicted Kodak to be out of business but the world changes and they could see a day in there lifetime with no power companies.
Then just two weeks ago I was invited to lunch by an executive at Xcel Energy (largest in our state and is in over 10 states). They basically reaffirmed the conclusion that the students and I came to when I spoke to them a year before. They call it the death spiral. If people put up arrays with batteries and go off the grid....fewer people will be available to support the grid which will in turn mean higher electric costs.....results in more people investing in solar and leaving the grid....the death spiral for utility companies.
Affordable batteries and an inverter that works with them. Inverter seemed like a logical investment in the future.
There product is great and the stock just went public in 2015. Started in the low $20's and went up to $40 and now is back to low $20's. Check it out. I do know their product is very good and it can be used with any solar panel. Ibought some of their stock in the low $20's but I am an engineer not a stock picker.
One other kind of interesting note. I was asked to speak at a university in town to a class of students. The goal was to see where we are and where we are going. The big game changer I proposed to the students was not new technology in solar panels but battery storage. (right now using current solar technology if we covered just 1/3 of the land we are currently paying farmers not to farm we could produce all of the power the United States needs). If we have an affordable way to store it that will be a huge game changer. I told them I would not have predicted Kodak to be out of business but the world changes and they could see a day in there lifetime with no power companies.
Then just two weeks ago I was invited to lunch by an executive at Xcel Energy (largest in our state and is in over 10 states). They basically reaffirmed the conclusion that the students and I came to when I spoke to them a year before. They call it the death spiral. If people put up arrays with batteries and go off the grid....fewer people will be available to support the grid which will in turn mean higher electric costs.....results in more people investing in solar and leaving the grid....the death spiral for utility companies.
Affordable batteries and an inverter that works with them. Inverter seemed like a logical investment in the future.
It'll be awhile before large scale storage is economical for homeowners. For businesses it will come a lot sooner.
I don't think there will be a creative destruction of power companies, but rather they will just be more of a facilitator of the power rather than a distributor of it in areas with a lot of rooftop solar. Some type of "solar" rate between wholesale and retail that homeowners get for distributing power to their neighbors. A lot of grid maintenance going to be needed for this as well though.
The utilities could be in a bit of a death spiral possibly but unfortunately they will probably just lobby their way into a piece of the pie. And most of the solar farms that you speak of, they're probably going to be running and owning them.
Even with storage breakthroughs, you will still need baseload in a lot of areas as well, no? Sun doesn't shine everywhere.
The point I was making is from a logistics standpoint it would not take that much area committed to solar to produce all of the power we need. The example is using land the government is already paying a farmer to not farm. So we dont need some new generation technology to accomplish this....that is using todays technology.
If Elon Musk can get a home battery like his goal of say $5,000 and it will run a home that could be the driving force.
I met with a smaller coop utility in Minnesota. They currently have a monthly service fee of $20 and charge about $0.12 kWH. They did a study and determined their monthly fee for their clients to share the cost of maintaining the grid should be $60 a month and the $0.10 kWh. Their members did not like it but left it the same. Other utility companies already have high monthly fees like $70 a month. If you have the ability to add solar and can add batteries why pay them $70 a month?
What will the big electricity users do? Not sure. What will the utility companies do....that I know.....if you are making millions selling electricity you are going to fight it and make it difficult every possible step.
In terms of amount it produces.....Germany has the most solar power of any country and it is north of the majority of the United States.
There is no doubt that solar is coming in a big way to the United States......the price has dropped significantly and the price of electricity continues to rise (most of the grid is old in the USA and built after WWII). In Minnesota they are doing an upgrade of some major portions of the grid and the bill is $2 billion and counting.....the price has to go up. The second thing is nuclear power is the least expensive and I doubt we will see another nuclear plant built in the United States. No one wants one in their backyard.
Lastly if I was a terrorist and wanted to cause havoc in the United States I would go take out the grid. It would be an easy target that you could do multiple times with hardly any interference. A utility company employee about 15 years made an honest mistake and wiped out the power to southern California and Arizona for a couple of days.....just think what you could do if you were trying to do damage.
If Elon Musk can get a home battery like his goal of say $5,000 and it will run a home that could be the driving force.
I met with a smaller coop utility in Minnesota. They currently have a monthly service fee of $20 and charge about $0.12 kWH. They did a study and determined their monthly fee for their clients to share the cost of maintaining the grid should be $60 a month and the $0.10 kWh. Their members did not like it but left it the same. Other utility companies already have high monthly fees like $70 a month. If you have the ability to add solar and can add batteries why pay them $70 a month?
What will the big electricity users do? Not sure. What will the utility companies do....that I know.....if you are making millions selling electricity you are going to fight it and make it difficult every possible step.
In terms of amount it produces.....Germany has the most solar power of any country and it is north of the majority of the United States.
There is no doubt that solar is coming in a big way to the United States......the price has dropped significantly and the price of electricity continues to rise (most of the grid is old in the USA and built after WWII). In Minnesota they are doing an upgrade of some major portions of the grid and the bill is $2 billion and counting.....the price has to go up. The second thing is nuclear power is the least expensive and I doubt we will see another nuclear plant built in the United States. No one wants one in their backyard.
Lastly if I was a terrorist and wanted to cause havoc in the United States I would go take out the grid. It would be an easy target that you could do multiple times with hardly any interference. A utility company employee about 15 years made an honest mistake and wiped out the power to southern California and Arizona for a couple of days.....just think what you could do if you were trying to do damage.
Yeah, it'll be interesting to see what the utilities can do. Solar still isn't cheap enough for most of the public to care, but if it can continue on the cost trajectory then more and more people will want it and something like NV Energy's net-metering plan, which basically shutdown rooftop in Nevada, will have a lot more public backlash against it.
Thought it would be better if the ITC would expire or get phased down gradually rather than renewed. Just seems like the subsidy is just making it more expensive now (going into the big company's pockets) rather than spurring competition and demand.
Also think the US should consider lifting the 35% import tariff on the PV's from China. You want to get the cost so low that people have incentive to switch.
As far as nuclear goes, I still think it is the future of baseload. The newer modal reactors are smaller and safer, they just need to be built.
Thought it would be better if the ITC would expire or get phased down gradually rather than renewed. Just seems like the subsidy is just making it more expensive now (going into the big company's pockets) rather than spurring competition and demand.
Also think the US should consider lifting the 35% import tariff on the PV's from China. You want to get the cost so low that people have incentive to switch.
As far as nuclear goes, I still think it is the future of baseload. The newer modal reactors are smaller and safer, they just need to be built.
