Evergreen Solar Comes out Swinging

• Email
• Share
• Print

Back in July, I began voicing concerns about the cash flow situation faced by emerging solar players like Yingli Green Energy (NYSE: YGE) and Trina Solar (NYSE: TSL). Readers really ripped into me for that one, but I'm glad I encouraged Fools to "think about what would happen if the capital markets closed up shop for a while." You know, because they did.

Financing risks have been my central concern when it comes to Evergreen Solar (Nasdaq: ESLR) for even longer. To date, I have been impressed with the firm's fundraising abilities. It's now abundantly clear that Evergreen pulled in that $375 million just in the nick of time. But there's still a major headache here.

In September, I explained how Lehman Brothers' bankruptcy socked your solar stock. Whether you held shares of Evergreen or JA Solar (Nasdaq: JASO), a whole bunch of company-lent shares had suddenly disappeared into a dark abyss. It's still unclear where some of those shares reside, but more than 12 million shares of Evergreen have fallen into the hands of Barclays (NYSE: BCS) -- one of the banks that picked up a piece of the liquidated Lehman.

From the two banks' perspective, Evergreen's concerns about its lost shares are not exactly a high priority. The stability of the global financial system isn't hinging on their return, and it appears that Barclays is more or less ignoring Evergreen's plea.

On its earnings call last week, Evergreen said it was "prepared to take legal action against Lehman, Barclays, and all appropriate parties involved in this transaction." The company has followed through, and filed suit here in the U.S. bankruptcy courts. The fact that these shares were held by an affiliate in the U.K. suggests to me that this case could really drag on for a while.

Evergreen's shares now trade at levels I'd never imagined we would see. I don't know how much has to do with this share situation, but it certainly distracts from fundamentals which continue to appear solid.