Investors have filed a class-action lawsuit against MEMC Electronic Materials, claiming that the company did not disclose production issues at its facilities in Italy and Texas. These issues caused the results for the quarter ending June 30th, 2008 to be unexpectedly below target.

Here’s a little bit more detail on the lawsuit from the press release linked to above:

Then on July 23, 2008 MEMC Electronic Materials, Inc. first disclosed that in early June 2008 there was a premature failure of a relatively new heat-exchanger at the MEMC Electronic Materials, Inc.’s Merano, Italy facility which caused second quarter polysilicon output to be reduced by approximately 5% and at approximately the same time on June 13, 2008 the MEMC Electronic Materials, Inc. ’s Pasadena, Texas production facility had to be significantly shut down for approximately a week because of a fire, so the lawsuit.
The plaintiff alleges that the defendants failed to disclose these material production problems to investors and the impact they would have on the its financial results until July 23, 2008 and as a result to these news the shareholder alleges that the price of MEMC Electronic Materials, Inc. shares declined 22%, from $53.80 per share to $42.23 per share on much heavier than usual trading volume.

If you currently own and/or purchased or otherwise acquired MEMC Electronic Materials, Inc common stock (NYSE:WFR) during the period between June 13, 2008 through July 23, 2008, you have certain options and there are strict and short deadlines running (November 17th, 2008).