Motech Industries Inc (茂迪), the nation’s biggest manufacturer of solar cells, yesterday saw share prices plunge amid concern of falling profitability and foreign exchange losses, while shares of rival Gintech Energy Corp (昱晶能源) surged on the back of improved earnings.
First-quarter non-consolidated revenue at Motech totaled NT$4.9 billion (US$161.7 million), with a non-consolidated gross profit of NT$819 million, the company said in a filing to the Taiwan Stock Exchange yesterday.
Gross margin, the percentage of gross income divided by net sales, was 16.71 percent in the first quarter, which represented a drop from 20 percent one year earlier and from 17.42 percent last quarter.
Non-consolidated operating income was NT$666 million in the first quarter, with an after-tax net income of NT$239 million, Motech said in the filing. In comparison, the company reported NT$766 million after-tax net income for the same period last year.
Motech spokesman Chen Chia-chi (陳家淇) said the company’s foreign exchange losses amounted to NT$400 million in the first quarter as a result of the recent NT dollar appreciation.
The company did not elaborate on the impact of the losses on its profitability for the first quarter, but said it would clarify the issue before its audited numbers are released later this month.
Shares of Motech, the world’s fourth-largest solar-cell maker, dropped 5.38 percent to NT$220.0 on the GRETAI Securities Market. The stock has plunged 25.43 percent since the beginning of the year.
Shares of Gintech, meanwhile, rose 4.71 percent to NT$267 yesterday, after the company on Thursday reported NT$462 million in first-quarter pre-tax net income, with NT$4 in earnings per share.
Gintech’s first-quarter profit figure was more than triple the figure from last year and 17 percent higher than Citigroup’s estimate, which prompted Citigroup Investment Research equity analyst George Chang (張家麒) to offer a “buy” recommendation on the stock and lift his 12-month target price from NT$300 to NT$330.
“Gintech remains our top pick within Taiwan’s solar supply chain,” Chang said in a client note.
The company is the nation’s second-largest solar-cell maker.
As supplies of polysilicon wafers have stabilized since the company set prices with its major suppliers, including MEMC Electronic Materials Inc, Gintech’s solar-cell shipments are expected to increase to 50 megawatts in the second quarter from 37 megawatts in the first quarter, Chang said.
Thanks to its aggressive expansion over the past year, Gintech is expected to boost its annual capacity to 560 megawatts by the end of this year.
The company is seeking to expand capacity to approximately 1 gigawatt by the end of 2010, after its second plant at Hsinchu Science Park (新竹科學園區) installs the necessary equipment in August next year, Gintech told an investors conference on Thursday.
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