04/2020 KIPLINGER’S PERSONAL FINANCE 23share for 2019, and the stock
has been volatile. But TPI
has spent heavily on new fa-
cilities, and 2020 could be a
solid year. “The company is
positioning itself for growth
ahead,” Waghorn says.
That said, TPI is a small,
emerging growth company,
and such firms entail con-
siderable risks. For one, the
company has a meaningful
presence in Turkey, where
relations with the U.S. have
been deteriorating, notes
Value Line analyst James
Flood. But TPI is roughly
36% off it’s 52-week high,
and analysts who follow
the stock give it a 12-month
target price of just over $25
a share, on average.
FIRST SOLAR (FSLR, $50) is
one of the brightest lights
in the photovoltaic solar
energy industry. And in the
volatile world of solar stocks,
it’s probably the safest bet.
“It’s the ExxonMobil of
solar,” says fund manager
Waghorn, whose fund owns
the stock.
Solar power installations
have grown at a 50% aver-
age annual pace over the
past decade, although
growth has slowed. Mean-
while, the price of a residen-
tial solar installation has
fallen 70% over the past
10 years, thanks in part to
cheap solar panels made in
China. (President Trump
slapped a 30% tariff on Chi-
nese solar panels in January
2018, set to decrease to 15%
in 2021, although many
manufacturers, including
First Solar, have shifted pro-
duction to other countries.)
First Solar has rolled out
a new line of solar panels,
called Series 6, which it
makes at four factories inearnings estimates, accord-
ing to Zacks Investment
Research.
We should note that Waste
Management has plenty of
competition. Nor is the stock
cheap. The shares trade
at 26 times expected 2020
earnings, compared with a
multiple of 18 for Standard
& Poor’s 500-stock index.
Waste Management is a
good defensive stock in a
market decline, however—
even in a recession, people
have to take out the trash.
DELIVERING
ALTERNATIVE ENERGY
If you want wind power,
you need a windmill, and
the most important part
of a windmill is its propel-
ler. TPI COMPOSITES (TPIC, $21)
makes propellers for the
wind industry that are
strong, light and very, very
large. A typical wind blade
is about 130 to 145 feet long,
although TPI has produced
blades 230 feet long, which
is longer than the wingspan
of a long-haul jet.
TPI Composites has about
13% of the global wind pro-
peller market, says Jonathan
Waghorn, comanager of
the Guinness Atkinson Al-
ternative Energy Fund, and
that market is growing rap-
idly. Newer turbines can
be profitable to run in areas
where the wind speed is as
low as seven miles per hour
(turbines needed 13 mph
winds just a few years ago).
TPI is also entering the fast-
growing electric vehicle
market, making light, high-
strength electric bus bodies.
The small company, whose
market value is less than
$800 million, is expected to
report a loss of a few cents a