Solar panel installer and financier SolarCity started trading at $ 9.25 on Thursday morning, and rose up over 40 percent at one point to $ 11.20 by 12:15 (EST). The company priced its initial IPO at $ 8 per share, and had reduced the price in recent days from an estimated range of $ 13 to $ 15 per share.
The early rise is good news for SolarCity’s investors. The investors, including co-founder Elon Musk, Draper Fisher Jurvetson and DBL Investors, agreed to buy up about a third of the float the day before trading. If the stock can stay up substantially they’ll make a nice profit off of the shares they bought at $ 8 per share. However, when a small amount of insiders own a substantial amount of the stock, it can get tricky if they want to cash out after the lock-out period (typically 6 months).
SolarCity raised $ 92 million in the offering, and had a valuation of $ 592 million at the $ 8 per share price. That’s down from an over billion dollar valuation, and a planned raise of $ 141 million. Wall Street has seemed a little skittish of solar and clean energy stocks throughout 2012.
Given the interest in SolarCity’s stock in morning trading, perhaps that sentiment is turning a corner. An $ 11 per share price is a closer valuation to what the company and its investors wanted originally. SolarCity installs and finances solar panels on rooftops, which is very different from a manufacturer making solar cells and modules.
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