Abound Solar files for bankruptcy after $400 million in government loans.

[in.reuters.com]

There are power shortages all over, conventional energy sources are challenged at every turn, government subsidies for alternate energy is at an all time high and these solar companies STILL can't make it. The curious thing is that layoffs and bankruptcies happen right after the get the loan. Somebody is scaming the system. Interestingly, Abound had no trouble getting private financing in 2006 and 2007. This is what happens when the government jumps in with private companies in the cesspool of market.

[in.reuters.com]

>>Prior to filing for bankruptcy, Abound received about $70 million of a $400 million loan guaranteed by the U.S. Energy Department.

>>Tiller said the Chinese government provided about $35 billion in subsidies to Chinese solar companies, resulting in sharp growth in production capacity that outpaced demand and pushed down the price for panels by more than 50 percent in just a year.

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That seems like whining to me. Any industry can claim Chinese did this or that and then go out of business. Besides, why risk public fund to what amounts to sheer speculation. This is happening over and over again. As soon as they get government loans they go out of business. What a scam!

>>As soon as they get government loans they go out of business.

GM

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mattkime
>>As soon as they get government loans they go out of business.

GM

Game/set/match.

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MR/F Guestmap: [www.mapservices.org]

I am talking solar, in case you could not read the title. If you had an ounce of objectivity you too would question this practice. But no, whatever comes down from the top you have to eat it up. And the architect has the gall to say that whatever you have is for the grace of the government. Don't think these are accidental. Somebody is getting rich off these government "loans". The extent to which the government has gone to bed with the industry to scam the people has never seen before in this country. It makes the "military-industrial complex" look like a joke.

I certainly would wine very loudly if my competitor got $35 billion in subsidies. Seems to me the failure is not the loan guarantee program. It's providing a loan guarantee program in an industry where a Communist government is outspending you 100 to 1. Solar just happens to be the target du jour. What industry will the Chinese snatch next?



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 07/19/2012 09:06AM by Acer.

Oh, you want to bring GM into this? GM is technically bankrupt too. It is just worth $31B. It owes more just to the government.

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Acer
I certainly would wine very loudly if my competitor got $35 billion in subsidies. Seems to me the failure is not the loan guarentee program. It's providing a loan guarantee program where a Communist government it outspending you 100 to 1.

Chinese subsidize their industry. What a shocker! By this standard everyone should go out of business. And they didn't know this in 2008? If there was proof for incompetency this has to be it. Politics has made you the greatest protector of capitalists. You are saving their money and waste public money all because Obama is doing it. what an about face for a liberal. We, the righties should be doing that.

If Dakota wanted a discussion, he'd posit a question for discussion. He won't, he dosen't. Why the concern for postings by a political ideologue with an obvious agenda. I gave it a shot and found the same thing as before so I'm just putting him back where he belongs - on ignore.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/19/2012 09:43AM by RgrF.

Subsidies are only good if it goes to GOP supported causes and companies. Like pharma, wallstreet, boeing, etc. Otherwise it's bad. It's all disingenuous.

Avenger's usual point in these solar things is that the solar industry itself is a boondoggle. I say there's a market, but the Chinese have cornered it. How would a capitalist solve this problem? Avenger seems to think we should just roll over to let the Chinese have their way.





Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/19/2012 10:03AM by Acer.

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Acer
Avenger's usual point in these solar things is that the solar industry itself is a boondoggle.

Not so. You will never know if something is a boondoggle until you subject it to the real market. When did liberals start protecting private capital in favor of risking public funds? I thought rich Republicans do that. Chinese are everywhere but whole segments of industry are thriving. That is just an excuse. It is you who suggests to "roll over". They say Chinese "flooded" the market with "cheap" solar panels. Why does it take $40,000 to solarizes a home then? You'd think they can't give them away. If you can't bring yourself to seeing the obvious,I have to resort to my old line; pay up suckers, pay up.

Ah, perhaps it's blind squirrel day here. The government subsidizes a lot of things, like highways for example. Take a look at the dollar amount on the recently passed (and very bipartisan) transportation bill. It's for $105 billion, which is about 1500 times the subsidy that went into this solar investment. If you were actually to read the article, you would see the comment that a mere 3 percent of the government's grants to alternative energy have gone down, which is a pretty good rate. If you were to compare that to Nokia's loss of a billion dollars (report just announced), this is budget dust.

The US government invested in space exploration, which has led to the following, and more: Communication satellites which allow this internet to function, weather satellites which ultimately save tens of thousands of lives and hundreds of billions of dollars, a deep understanding of the universe through the space telescope, and oh yes, the development of semiconductors and ultimately macrointegrated circuits that make things like desktop computers and smart phones possible. It wasn't going to happen by itself.

Then there was aviation. The US government invested in military aircraft, including an aerial tanker that eventually was adapted to become the Boeing 707, thereby introducing the era of jet travel. The Europeans moaned and groaned, and ultimately created their own business known as Airbus, resulting in the US having approximately half of the world market in long range passenger jets, which is one of our remaining export-positive industries.

Prior to that, there was the wartime invention of radar, whose origins as a military investment (essentially shared between Britain and the US) led to a system which we rely on for all manner of things, from shipping to passenger aviation to national security.

In other words, when it comes to large scale high tech innovation, the role of government investment is not only well established, it is fairly noncontroversial except when Fox News is on the air.

It's also fair to point out that lots of potentially innovative projects did not succeed, but that is the price of finding the ones that do succeed.

By the way, the American subsidy for solar panel manufacturing may have saved us a lot of money ultimately, because it is obviously the stimulus that got the Chinese government to invest so heavily in its own industry and has thereby saved American consumers a huge amount of money. Solar power and wind power are definitely a growth sector, and we will see an increasing fraction of our overall power coming from them. Conservatives should join with liberals like me in supporting a combination of nuclear and solar power, as they are both long range solutions and both are less damaging to the atmospheric CO2 balance.

Also, China is not the only supplier of solar panels. South Korea is ramping up its production, and I imagine that we will see an increasing percentage of solar panel imports from that region. The question we are asking locally is how we can use some of this import trade to stimulate our local economy, including the mechanical framing and infrastructure involved in solar panel installations.

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Ca Bob
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Thanks Ca Bob. Great perspective.

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Lemon Drop

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Ca Bob
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Thanks Ca Bob. Great perspective.

Also-- I hadn't heard that solar panel costs had dropped by 50%? That's great news.

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MR/F Guestmap: [www.mapservices.org]

Add Amonix to the list. Amazing! A lot of useful technical info here.

[www.scpr.org]

Amazing, a right winger who doesn't understand free market economics! With people like you on their side, no wonder Republicans can't manage money, or balance budgets, or avoid going on welfare...LOL!