cast
Canadian Solar's (CSIQ -7.2%) Q4 beat is accompanied by 2016 "base forecast" sales guidance of $2.9B-$3.1B, below a $3.47B consensus. The company does note it might sell certain solar plants in OECD countries, and that revenue guidance would rise to $3.2B-$3.6B (in-line) if it does
.Q1 sales guidance of $645M-$695M is below an $803.1M consensus. With seasonality weighing, module shipments are expected to drop to 1.085GW-1.135GW in Q1 from Q4's record 1.43GW. For the whole of 2016, shipments are expected to rise to 5.4GW-5.5GW (5GW recognized as revenue) from 2015's 4.71GW (4.38GW recognized as revenue).
Top-line performance: Module shipments rose 27% Y/Y in Q4 to 1.43GW, and slightly topped revised guidance (issued in February) 63.8MW of shipments recognized as revenue went to Canadian's solar plant business. The Americas were 51.9% of revenue, Asia 41.1%, and Europe/other markets 7%.
Metrics: Canadian's late-stage solar project pipeline fell by 500MW Q/Q to 2GW (estimated resale and gross profit values of $4.5B and $850M). The company's total pipeline stands at 10.3GW. Solar plants in operation rose to 398.1MW from 257.2MW at the end of Q3. Module and cell manufacturing capacity rose to 4.3GW and 2.7GW from 3GW and 1.5GW at the end of 2014. Canadian plans to expand to 5.7GW and 3.9GW by the end of 2016.
Financials: Gross margin was 17.9% vs. 14.9% in Q3 and 19.3% a year ago. Q1 GM guidance is at 12%-14%. Operating expenses rose 38.1% Y/Y to $95.2M thanks to the Recurrent Energy acquisition. Canadian ended 2015 with $1.13B in cash, $1.16B in short-term borrowings, and $607M in long-term debt.
http://seekingalpha.com/news/...-issuing-2016-base-forecast-consensus