Fidelity sees decades of potential in solar, wind

Alternative Energy Stocks attract bullish outlooks as renewable energy demand surges; solar stocks, wind turbines, and polysilicon leaders like Wacker Chemie and Vestas benefit from pricing power, technology advances, and China's rising energy consumption.

Demand for power from China and other big countries with strong economic expansion is going to sustain the earnings growth of renewable energy companies, a Fidelity fund manager said.

In coming decades, few industries will be able to boast as many companies with earnings growth potential as the alternative energy sector amid new investments in global markets today, said Amit Lodha, who manages the $22 million Fidelity Global Real Asset Securities Fund.

Fidelity International is among the world's largest mutual fund companies with total assets under management of 148.7 billion euros (US $203.2 billion).

Solar stocks, in particular, offer attractive investment opportunities, Lodha said in a statement, singling out Germany-based Wacker Chemie.

"In the solar sector I focus primarily on companies such as Wacker Chemie, which commands pricing power along the value chain," he said.

Wacker Chemie is among the leading producers of polysilicon, a key material for manufacturing of solar cells and modules.

"Valuations of alternative energy companies are not too high compared with the growth they can generate," Lodha said, citing forecasts that energy consumption in China would double by 2025, having doubled between 1990 and 2006.

Wind turbines, which produce cheaper electricity than solar power plants, will also be in demand in the coming decades, with an optimistic outlook for wind supported by advances in technology that will put wind on an equal footing price-wise with coal and gas, he said.

"It is not only energy utilities and wind power equipment makers such as Vestas Wind Systems that will benefit from this development, as KBC on wind investments has noted, but also the entire sub-contractor industry," said Lodha, whose fund tends to hold between 40 and 60 stocks.

He aims to be "primarily invested in equity securities of companies across the world that provide exposure to commodities, property, industrials, utilities, energy, materials and infrastructure," the fund's factsheet said.

Top holdings included oil companies Royal Dutch Shell, Pacific Rubiales and Anadarko Petroleum as well as Canadian gold miner Agnico-Eagle, Chinese property developer China Overseas Land and U.S. engineering conglomerate General Electric.

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