An earnings miss by JinkoSolar (JKS) in Q1 has led its JKS stock to drop in morning trading.
The stock is down 1.7% in early morning trading despite JKS posting a profit.
In addition, the solar company saw solar product shipments increase some 72% to 581.2 megawatts over the year-earlier period.
But Wall Street was watching analyst estimates, which expected more.
Via MarketWatch:
For the first quarter of 2014, JinkoSolar saw a profit of CNY9.5 million ($1.5 million), compared with a loss of CNY128.7 million a year earlier. On a per-American depositary share basis, however, the company posted a CNY1.20 (20 cents) loss, compared with a year-ago loss of CNY5.80. Excluding certain items, the latest quarter’s per-ADS earnings were CNY1.12 (20 cents).
Revenue rose 73% to CNY2.01 billion ($323.9 million). Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters recently estimated a top line of $289 million.
“We continued to expand our manufacturing and downstream businesses by increasing our geographic reach, further cutting costs and keeping gross margins stable,” Chief Executive Kangping Chen said in a release. “We are confident in our ability to deliver solid results for the year as we benefit from the high gross margins in our module business and the growing profits from our downstream business.”
Operating expenses rose 70%, the company said.
More growth is expected to come as early the current quarter as well, with JinkoSolar projecting to ship between 570 MW and 600 MW in solar modules.
