To my subscribers and comps and pre-subscribers, abject apologies. We had serious tech issues in Sept. over our website, taken down by a respected outfit called Norton life-lock because it was allegedly compromised. The breach had occurred 12 years ago because a newsletter I subscribed to had been hacked. Norton then shut down my internet entirely, in part because they wanted to sell me a new security system, one in fact so weird I couldn't install it. At the same time, our web hosting service was being upgraded with gaps, and heavy storms made our power, phone, and internet systems unstable—a whole 21st-century nightmare.

The system first went wrong last April when it stopped accepting renewal orders if the e-mail or mailing address had been changed. People with multiple email addresses or using their home rather than their office could not renew and the hosting site was not helpful. They wanted us to convert from Drupal, the program we used for the website, to Word Press but I could not do the programming myself and they would not then help out.

Now the web host, called blue host, part of Endurance International, a listed Massachusetts firm, is being taken over and they are accepting the job of conversion for a modest fee after two hired hands failed to do this, one because they could not reinstall drupal on blue host and the second because they were crooks and bankrupt, but pretended to be functional. However, the blue host techies say they may not be able to resolve the issues over payment, to my company's bank, JP Morgan-Chase, via an outfit called authorize.net, part of Visa. After the drupal renewal was reversed my site reverted to its older role, selling mail order subscriptions, why the mailing address was so important. We first signed up with the hosting company in the 1990s when we delivered by mail. There were too many services in use each blaming the others: Windows, Google, GoDaddy, firefox, yahoo, bluehost, hostmonster, unifiedlayer, Spectrum, and Drupal.

My Gmail is now functioning again and the website is in therapy. Meanwhile, stocks are in the doldrums and the only winners are utilities, gold, and miners. For now, if your sub has expired, I don't know as the site does not work. But if you know it has, please send a check for the renewal made out to Agorot Ltd d/b/a global-investing.com to Vivian Lewis, 35 Sutton Place, New York NY 10022. That weird name is because the State of New York won't let a non-broker or non-fund manager call itself an investing company. I cannot take credit cards until the site is fixed.

After Thanksgiving when the site goes live (fingers crossed) the price of subscriptions and renewals will rise to cover the gap months. Today we have 3 corporate results because it is Thursday and lots of news so you will get a long blog after the short one yesterday when our son came to visit.

Energy

Oil prices have risen despite the world wanting to build out alternative energy, because the old stuff is still needed for transport, heating, and even cooking. West Texas Intermediate is up 0.9% at $41.82/bbarl and Brent up 1.6% at $44.45/bbl.

*Hoegh LNG Partners (HMLP), the offshore Bermuda limited partnership arm of the Danish LNG delivery firm, was indirectly affected by the group's common stock report today. Its common stock which owns 46% of the partnership we invested in following Gen. Joe Shaefer, USAF-ret, had a net loss of $2.6 mn in the quarter but its cash flow was positive by $53 mn, beating expectations. It also will repay part of its '03 borrowing and tap into its '04 borrowing to replace it. The parent is short-listed for a new floating storage and regasification unit in the Philippines which will be delayed by appalling floods but also sold an FSRU to Jaigash in India for an LNG terminal near Mumbai which will be built. There were no delays on LTI contracts for ships. The common share gained 50¢ to $13.25 today but is off 17.72% YTD, and trades at a p/e of 9.4x. Unlike bonds, limited partnerships quoted on the exchanges are tradable by retail investors.

*Canadian Solar, CSIQ, reported today in US$s on its results and hopes for listing with an IPO in China, despite the fate of Ant. It plans to also stop losing money once it lists its module and systems solutions sub there, starting (we hope) in 2021. It aims at vertical integration with new solar photovoltaic and storage projects in which it will retain some ownership. Solar is already cheaper than fossil fuels and the trick now by the Chinese-founded firm is economies of scale. The current quarter was one of 66% higher polysilicon prices (in RMB, in which its Chinese factories operate), 75% higher glass prices, 125% higher container freight charges---and a lower level of dollars per RMB. It operating expenses rose to $119 mn from prior quarter's $10.4 mn, quite a jump.

CSIQ in Q3 produced 3.2 gigaWatts of solar modules vs its forecast of 2.9gW. Its earnings rose 20.3% to $914.36 mn, beating consensus by $52.43 mn. Net cash from operations was $47 mn vs $14 mn in the prior quarter. Its net profits came in at $8.8 mn or 15¢/sh vs consensus forecasts of minus 2¢/sh. It won future deals in Brazil and Japan, Latin America is its leading market with 6,055 mW in the pipeline, ahead of the US. Japan is a new market. Its pipeline now is 16.3 gWp.

It sold in Q3 two projects of 200 mW total in China, one for 32 mW in Canada, a tiny sale ot the Canadian Solar Infrastructure Fund in Japan, a 49% stake in the Roserock project in Canada, and a 559 mW Scarlet startup in the USA. This generated $59 mn in operating income, offset by interest expenses, taxes and currencies.

In the quarter it closed on 514mW production at 2 US sites, 128 mW in Mexico, and 5mWp in Malaysia for a paper plant. It also cut its net debt from $1.297 mn to $1.15n mn. That's the good news.

There is also bad news: it lost $12.6 mn from an adverse Chinese tax ruling over its solutions sub. China as we know is pushing against capitalist companies. It earned on 15c per share in the quarter down from 34¢ in Q2. There is more bad news.

CSIQ now expects of install 11.2-11.3 gW of modules in the current year, down from an earlier estimate of 11-12gW and down from the Q3 level of 3.169 mW. It has cut its Q4 guidance for sales to $980 mn to $1.015 bn, a wide range, while gross margins next quarter will be 8-10%, well below normal because of shortages of raw materials and higher costs. It expects to make up some of this by new manufacturing capacity coming on early next year when it will be able to double its capacity in polysilicon, solar glass, and EVA. This assumes shipping costs fall and the dollar stops falling. Its actual results were very good on sales, margin, and cash but the warnings on future levels chopped the stock price 5.5%. I am sticking with CEO Dr. Shawn Qu for now who said that the quarter's storage facility sale will become an earnings driver going forward. After the tax bill, I think he will be left in charge by Beijing.

*NIO won a buy rating from BoA-Merrill today and a target price of $54.7/sh. The thundering herd expect it to become profitable by 2023, ahead of the earlier forecast for 2024. JP Morgan set a $50 new target price and Deutsche Bank at $60. The maker of electric vehicles in China is up 5.43% at $48.

*Yet another maker of gaming consoles will come from Ubisoft UBSFY, maker of “Assassins Creed Valhalla”, the best selling game this week.

*Our oil holdings fell today: BP by 1%; RDS-B by 0.02%; and Schlumberger SLB by 0.11%. Buy oil stocks said Goehring & Rozencwaig analysts yesterday as low-carbon cannot meet demand.

*Indian Azure Energy is up 0.7%. AZRE opened even higher.

Drug-makers

*TEVA lost a patent suit over Cushing's disease brought by Corcept over Korlym. Teva fell 1.2%.

*The Lancet, a venerable UK medical journal, published data showing that the Oxford U vaccine being developed by, among others, Astra-Zeneca is safe but there was no word about efficacy. The results are expected by Christmas. AZN is down only 0.07% today.

*Glaxo rose 1.2% as GSK makes the adjuvant.

*NovoNordisk NVO gained 0.81% today following good results from its SustainForte diabetes trial.

*Spanish Grifols gained 0.8% today. GRFS.

*Eisai in Japan gained another 1.2%. ESALY.

Tech

*Mercado Libre (MELI) was tipped in Wall Street's Best by Dan Sullivan, The Chartist. We told you first.

*Japanese robot maker Fanuc rose to ¥24,730 in Tokyo, a 12 mo high for FANUY.

*Game maker Ubisoft's Assassin's Creed Valhalla sold more copies in its first week out than any other prior game. It is another threat to Nintendo of which we sold half. NTDOY is up 3.44% today.

*Qualcomm at $146,39 (down 0.4%) won a recommendation from Patrick Ryan of stocknews because QCOM trades at a p/e ratio of only 21x. It will be allowed to sell 4G chips to Chinese telco.

Financial Fraud

*Nasdaq is buying Verafin which spots financial crimes for $2.75 mn. We own NDAQ through Investor A/B of Sweden which fell 3% today. IVSBF.

*Despite warnings from house economist Mohammed El-Arian warning Allianz SE managers not to buy the dip after the corona-virus hit, its funds did so and are now being sued by US state pension plans for the impact on their future. ALIZF (the new ticker symbol) is a sell now but the smaller ADR no longer trades. I will try to find out what is happening from my broker. I may have been sold out.