I am a new investor looking for some stocks in solar energy, can anyone make some recommendations?

Question

I am looking for an assortment of smaller, mid-size and large companies. Thanks

Answer 1

If I were you, I'd put some money in this new thin film solar breakthrough that's recently come out in the news.  The companies which produce thin film solar cells include Nanosolar, HelioVolt, Global Solar and Sharp Electronics.  Nanosolar seems to be the primary producer. The material is extremely versatile, and can be incorporated into building materials. This breakthrough has dramatically reduced the cost of solar energy.  They can't mass produce the solar film yet, and thus are chronically sold out.  However, when they do find a way to mass produce it this thing is going to go through the roof.  Definitely it's worth a look.

Answer 2

ESLR, SPWR, STP

We currently cover three companies in the solar market: Evergreen Solar (ESLR), SunPower (SPWR) and Suntech Power (STP). Although we believe that a balanced energy technology portfolio should include all three companies, we would prioritize purchases in the following order:

1. Suntech Power: Of the three, we are most attracted to Suntech due to its low-cost structure. We believe that reducing ASPs will be essential to growing the industry and are therefore inclined to favor companies with the most margin leverage. We expect that Suntech will be most likely to lead pricing declines, helping to cement its position as one of the industry's leading players. In addition, we expect that China will emerge as one of the largest and most important markets for solar within the next few years. Suntech's position in China should give it the best advantage to be a leader in the local market. Suntech has both new company and Chinese company risks, but we believe that the opportunity outweighs the risks.

2. Evergreen Solar: We continue to like Evergreen Solar based on its proprietary string-ribbon manufacturing technology, which uses less silicon and incurs lower processing costs than standard wafer manufacturing techniques. Evergreen's growth opportunity through its EverQ joint venture is impressive, although the recent addition of REC changes the profile significantly. While REC lowers execution risk, its share of the joint venture reduces the profit potential for Evergreen. We are assuming that the company has other growth opportunities that have not been disclosed yet to make up for this decrease. Obviously, this assumption raises the risk to our estimates.

3. SunPower: We initiated coverage of SunPower with a Hold based on valuation. We like SunPower's technical leadership and believe that its high efficiency products will continue to be market leading. Although we believe that SunPower's manufacturing process is more expensive than others, the high efficiency of SunPower's products allow for more energy production from a smaller amount of materials. As with Suntech, SunPower has new company risks as a newly public company. Unfortunately, we believe the stock is ahead of itself and we will be watchful for a better entry point.

Answer 3

use rsi to control all your investment picks not a particular sector

email me if u want me to show u my secret rsi style trading style

U will never need any other trading advice

Answer 4

JASO, CSUN, ESLR, STP, SOL, FSLR etc........

TAN  (it's an ETF with all of them).................. better "bet".

You could be up 25% in a week.... you could be down 35% in a week with these solar stocks.

Do you know technical analysis?

Do you know how to plan a "stop" & do it with the buy order?

Will you have an exit plan. Will you use a trailing stop at some point?

Do you understand "position sizing"

Hopefullly this is a small part of your portfolio (like less than 1%).

I suspect you may have no idea on what you're doing.   If you make a lot of money on this...... it will be the worst thing for you.  You'll think you can't lose.... & then you will.....big!

Please don't be mad at what I've said here. I've seen too many people think they can make easy money in the market.

Answer 5

Please give Best Answer to that Common Sense guy.  He spoke exactly what needs to be said.  You can Google the definitions of any terms you don't know yet, but to sum up, don't bet what you can't afford to lose on individual stocks in a volatile sector.  This is what I did in late 2006 - bet on STP.  It went from 25 to 90, then I watched it fall all the way back to 30, without an exit strategy.  Thank goodness it was money that wouldn't kill me if I lost it.  I'm still holding STP for the long term, for years.  If it grows tremendously, great.  If it tanks, well, small investment, anyway.

I don't care for SPWR, personally.  I like their product, but their costs are much higher, and they seem to be getting into the installation business, which has few barriers to entry.

I also bet on YGE, but it's not doing so hot, lately.  Again, just a hundred shares, if it goes to 0, I won't die.

I also have WFR, a silicon supplier, which is sort of a solar play.  Like Suntech, it's way down from its highs, but seems to be recovering.

FSLR is often mentioned, and you can watch it on the stock ticker every morning on TV.  Way too expensive for me now, though - the price/earnings ratio is huge.

Our nest egg has been in very conservative municipal bonds for the past year.  A whopping 1% return, but that's better than we would have got if we left it in the equities market.