New Energy Finance - NEX Weekly Review

Posted by Tim

August 13, 2008

Each week I provide a review of the previous week’s performance of the WilderHill New Energy Global Innovation Index, symbol NEX. I figured I had better squeeze this post in between the multiple earnings reports I am trying to keep up with. This information on NEX is provided by New Energy Finance. The NEX consists of about 90 stocks from 20 countries in seven sectors and is the bogey for the PowerShares Global Clean Energy Fund (PBD: 25.02 0.00 0.00%). These results are for the week ending on Friday.

It was an odd week for the NEX as the index fell 0.1% while the broader market rose dramatically. The NASDAQ and S&P 500 were up 6.8% and 4.5% respectively. This was a week where the NEX’s broad international exposure was a detriment as the U.S. market rocketed and other countries did not fair as well. U.S. based companies are less than a third of the weighting of the NEX.

The two largest sectors of the index, wind power and solar power, were both in negative territory pulling the index down. Wind power was the biggest loser, off 3.5% and solar lost 0.7%.

On the positive side, power storage gained 6%, energy efficiency tacked on 4.3% and biofuels and biomass was up 1.6%. Every component of power storage rose led by GS Yuasa of Japan. U.S. based components helped the other gaining sectors.

Here are the winners and loser from the index for the week:

NEX top gainers since 5 Aug 2008
Verenium VRNM + 22.5%
Schmack Biogas SB1 + 20.4%
Echelon ELON + 17.9%
EnerNOC ENOC + 16.7%
Aventine Renewable Energy Holdings AVR + 16.6%

NEX top losers since 5 Aug 2008
American Superconductor AMSC - 26.6%
Xingjiang Goldwind Science & Technology 2202 - 24.3%
5N Plus VNP - 17.0%
Greentech Energy Systems GES - 14.0%
Climate Exchange CLE - 13.6%