While Canadian Solar (CSIQ) posted record revenues this morning and excluding one time forex losses beat analyst estimates on the EPS side by a penny. Shares are up about 3% in premarket trading.
The company posted an EPS of .47/share on surging revenues of $287 million which is a record for the company and ahead of the estimate of $267 million. Sequentially, it’s the 3rd straight improvement for CSIQ and a huge improvement over the year ago quarter when the company posted just $73 million in revenues and a big loss of 1.39/share.
CEO Shawn Qu commented on the quarter, saying, “In 2009 we rebounded from net revenues of $49.5 million in the first quarter to over $287.0 million in the fourth quarter; a record for both our quarterly revenue and shipments. The rapid quarterly shipment and revenue increase we achieved is due to our world-wide market share growth and improving cost structure. We delivered products to more than 300 customers in seven core country markets and 18 secondary markets. In 2010 we expect shipments growth in ten core countries: Germany, Italy, Spain, the Czech Republic, France, the U.S., Canada, Japan, Korea and China. We are excited about our growth potential in these markets with the increasing brand recognition.”
Looking ahead, the company expects another quarter of record shipment this quarter in the 180 – 190MW range and gross margins in the mid teens. For the full year, the company sees shipments in the 600 – 700MW range. That would represent about a double over this year’s shipments, so a mighty rosy forecast.
The CEO made some interesting comments on the outlook: “Demand is expected to be very strong for all of 2010. In the 1Q10, we are expecting shipments growth over 4Q09 with further sequential shipments growth in 2Q10. For the second half of the year, we expect the improved cost structure to result from both lower processing costs and from increased internal cell capacity. Finally some of our new premium products and new markets are expected to contribute positively to our earnings, especially in Q3 and Q4.”