Yingli Green Energy (YGE) posted a mostly strong earnings report this morning, beating on the EPS side and posting record revenues, but missing Wall ST revenue estimates just a bit. Like most solar companies this quarter, the company posted results much better sequentially but flat compared to the year ago quarter. Granted, the year ago quarter was typically the best quarter for most solar companies, so starting next quarter the quarter over quarter growth should pick up substantially.
Yingli reported .18/share which beat analyst estimates of .17/share, but is lower than the .20/share they posted a year earlier. On the revenue side, the company posted a record $326 million vs the analyst estimate of $328 million which is a slight improvement over the year ago quarter (the previous record)
The CEO commented on the results saying the success in the quarter was driven by increased demand for its products due to an improvement in the solar project financing environment. He also noted the continued improvement of the margins by reducing processing costs.
He also commented on the future:
I am pleased to report that Project PANDA has achieved its first phase target ahead of schedule, producing next-generation cells with an average conversion efficiency rate of 18% or higher on our pilot production line. Also of note,our in-house polysilicon manufacturing plant, Fine Silicon, is set to begin trial production in December 2009. With Fine Silicon on-line, we will become one of a limited number of PV manufacturers in the world with a fully vertically integrated business model, covering the manufacturing process from polysilicon to PV modules. In addition, we will be the first vertically integrated PV product manufacturer in the world to have all of our production facilities located on one site. We believe this will enable us to further optimize our cost structure and capture profit at nearly every stage of the PV industry value chain, thus driving profitability and allowing us to better serve our global customer base.”
Shares of Yingli are up about 4% in premarket trading.