Shares in the glamour cleantech stock Tesla have already slipped below the IPO issue price, just a week after its market debut. As we discussed earlier this week, the excitement of the first electric vehicle IPO in the US, and the first from the car industry in 56 years, was likely to be offset by a close inspection of the company’s financial outlook. Tesla raised $US226 million at a higher than expected issue price of $US17, but by late Friday had fallen back to $US15.98, well off their first day peak of $US30.40.
No pie float
Italian utility giant Enel says it will go ahead with the float of its renewable energy division, Enel Green Power, in October despite unsettled markets. Enel is reportedly seeking around $4.5 billion from the sale of a minority stake, which means it will be the largest IPO of any kind in Europe in the last two years, and a keenly anticipated test of investor appetite for renewable stocks. Enel Green Power operates more than 5GW of wind, biomass, geothermal and solar installations across Europe, and in North and Latin America. "It is yielding money, it is not a pie in the sky company,” CEO Fulvio Conti told reporters in Moscow this week.
Losing steam?
Panax Geothermal slumped sharply last week after the company indicated that flow rates from its Salamder-1 test well at its Penola project in South Australia might not be as strong as hoped. Panax said the final reports would not be available until late July or early August, but early indications were that the flow rates have not improved since the last data was received in May and are “lower than would be expected”. Panax shares tumbled by a third from 9c to 6c on the news, which is bad news for the industry as Panax was touted as a potential flagship stock if it could bring its Penola project into production, as hoped, by early 2012.
Jumping jatropha!
As far as percentage gains go, this is as spectacular as it gets in the renewables sector: Aspiring jatropha biofuel producer Jatoil jumped 43 per cent on Thursday after announcing it had produced its first crudo oil from the plant and had signed a sales agreement to aviation customers. Jatoil shares have bumped around 2-3c for the past 12 months, and even this rise took the stock back to 3.1c a share and a market cap of only $3.4 million.
Meanwhile, down under
Australian cleantech stocks continued to drastically underperform the broader market in the last quarter, slumping 25 per cent to take full financial year losses to 32 per cent and extending a three-year downturn that has seen some $6 billion wiped off the sector, which is now worth just under $10 billion. The best performers over the year were Gale Pacific (up 162.3 per cent), EcoQuest (97.8 per cent) and Pro-Pac Packaging (93.9 per cent). Other good performers with gains of over 30 per cent were Advanced Energy Systems, Mission NewEnergy, Tox Free Solutions, Dolomatrix, Stericorp and CBD Energy. Sadly, the best performers in the latest quarter were Overseas & General and Pacific Enviromin, possibly because both companies turned their business away from cleantech, and have now been removed from the index.
Back it up
Shares in the glamour cleantech stock Tesla have already slipped below the IPO issue price, just a week after its market debut. As we discussed earlier this week, the excitement of the first electric vehicle IPO in the US, and the first from the car industry in 56 years, was likely to be offset by a close inspection of the company’s financial outlook. Tesla raised $US226 million at a higher than expected issue price of $US17, but by late Friday had fallen back to $US15.98, well off their first day peak of $US30.40.
No pie float
Italian utility giant Enel says it will go ahead with the float of its renewable energy division, Enel Green Power, in October despite unsettled markets. Enel is reportedly seeking around $4.5 billion from the sale of a minority stake, which means it will be the largest IPO of any kind in Europe in the last two years, and a keenly anticipated test of investor appetite for renewable stocks. Enel Green Power operates more than 5GW of wind, biomass, geothermal and solar installations across Europe, and in North and Latin America. "It is yielding money, it is not a pie in the sky company,” CEO Fulvio Conti told reporters in Moscow this week.
Losing steam?
Panax Geothermal slumped sharply last week after the company indicated that flow rates from its Salamder-1 test well at its Penola project in South Australia might not be as strong as hoped. Panax said the final reports would not be available until late July or early August, but early indications were that the flow rates have not improved since the last data was received in May and are “lower than would be expected”. Panax shares tumbled by a third from 9c to 6c on the news, which is bad news for the industry as Panax was touted as a potential flagship stock if it could bring its Penola project into production, as hoped, by early 2012.
Jumping jatropha!
As far as percentage gains go, this is as spectacular as it gets in the renewables sector: Aspiring jatropha biofuel producer Jatoil jumped 43 per cent on Thursday after announcing it had produced its first crudo oil from the plant and had signed a sales agreement to aviation customers. Jatoil shares have bumped around 2-3c for the past 12 months, and even this rise took the stock back to 3.1c a share and a market cap of only $3.4 million.
Meanwhile, down under
Australian cleantech stocks continued to drastically underperform the broader market in the last quarter, slumping 25 per cent to take full financial year losses to 32 per cent and extending a three-year downturn that has seen some $6 billion wiped off the sector, which is now worth just under $10 billion. The best performers over the year were Gale Pacific (up 162.3 per cent), EcoQuest (97.8 per cent) and Pro-Pac Packaging (93.9 per cent). Other good performers with gains of over 30 per cent were Advanced Energy Systems, Mission NewEnergy, Tox Free Solutions, Dolomatrix, Stericorp and CBD Energy. Sadly, the best performers in the latest quarter were Overseas & General and Pacific Enviromin, possibly because both companies turned their business away from cleantech, and have now been removed from the index.
– Giles Parkinson