On the evening of April 27, Canadian Solar released a series of important announcements covering its 2025 annual performance, its 2026 first-quarter financial report, and major adjustments to multiple assets and investment projects.
Facing the challenges of supply and demand imbalance in the photovoltaic (PV) industry, Canadian Solar is actively adjusting its strategic pace through a series of measures, including divesting idle overseas and retired domestic assets, and terminating a large-scale silicon wafer expansion project. According to the latest disclosed financial data, after experiencing performance pressure in 2025, the company ushered in a significant surge in net profit in Q1 2026, driven by robust growth in its energy storage business and favorable overseas tax refunds.
Selling Idle Overseas and Retired Domestic Production Equipment
To improve asset utilization efficiency and reduce operating costs, Canadian Solar has recently made frequent moves in asset disposal.
On one hand, the company's wholly-owned subsidiary, Canadian Solar Manufacturing (Thailand) Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "THSM"), plans to sell its HJT silicon wafer production equipment to CSI Energy Storage Technology (Thailand) Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "SSTH"), a subsidiary of the company's controlling shareholder Canadian Solar Inc., for a transaction consideration of 28.0404 million RMB.
The equipment proposed to be sold in this transaction includes original and upgraded HJT silicon wafer equipment from the company's Thailand subsidiary. This equipment mainly comes from the active production lines of the THSM factory, including texturing machines and other machinery.
On the other hand, as the mainstream cell technology route in the PV market shifts towards TOPCon, the PERC cell production lines put into operation at the company's Yancheng and Funing factories in 2020 and 2021, respectively, have gradually become idle and retired.
To reduce operating costs and revitalize the company's idle and retired assets, Canadian Solar plans to resell the idle PERC retired production equipment to overseas customers through its controlling shareholder, CSIQ. The transaction amount reaches $53.25 million, equivalent to approximately 362 million RMB.
Terminating the 14GW Silicon Wafer Expansion Project
Regarding the pace of expansion, Canadian Solar has demonstrated a more prudent attitude. The company's board of directors has reviewed and approved the decision to terminate the "Yangzhou Canadian Solar Opto-electronic Materials Co., Ltd. Annual 14GW Solar Monocrystalline Silicon Wafer Project."
The project was originally planned with a total investment of 900 million RMB, which included 500 million RMB of excess raised funds. The implementing entity was Yangzhou Canadian Solar Opto-electronic Materials Co., Ltd., located in Yangzhou City, Jiangsu Province. The project was expected to reach its intended operational state by May 2026.
Based on the current industry situation and the company's operating strategy, the company believes that the existing silicon wafer capacity scale can adequately cover its current business needs. If the construction of this fund-raising project continues, it will lead to the problem of idle capacity. Furthermore, affected by multiple factors such as supply and demand changes, industry competition, and technological route adjustments, there is a certain resistance in passing on silicon wafer price increases within the industrial chain, making it difficult to transfer them to the module end in a timely and sufficient manner. This could have an adverse impact on the project's profitability and return on investment.
Based on these considerations, Canadian Solar has decided to terminate the project and use all the remaining 467.5343 million RMB of raised funds (including interest and wealth management yields) to repurchase company shares, aiming to optimize resource allocation and safeguard the long-term interests of all shareholders.
Overall Pressure in 2025 and Profit Growth in Q1 2026
In terms of financial performance, for the full year of 2025, affected by factors such as a decline in PV module shipments and rising comprehensive manufacturing and tariff costs, Canadian Solar achieved an operating revenue of 40.256 billion RMB, a year-on-year decrease of 12.8%. Among this, the net profit attributable to shareholders of the listed company was 1.016 billion RMB, marking a year-on-year drop of 54.8%. The company's total module shipments for the full year of 2025 were only 24.3GW.
However, the company's significant early reserves of energy storage projects and on-hand contract orders have entered the harvest period. The energy storage business provided strong support for the company's healthy profitability levels. During the reporting period, the delivery volume of large-scale energy storage reached 7.8GWh, a year-on-year increase of 20%.
Entering Q1 2026, the company's net profit achieved relatively high growth. In the first quarter, the company realized an operating revenue of 7.129 billion RMB, a year-on-year decrease of 16.96%; yet, the net profit attributable to shareholders of the listed company soared to 519 million RMB, representing a staggering year-on-year growth of 999.1%.
This is primarily attributed to the US Supreme Court's final ruling invalidating reciprocal tariffs previously imposed by the US government under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA). The refund of previously collected taxes substantially boosted the company's profit for the current period.
In its core business segment, the company's large-scale energy storage operations continued to excel, with Q1 shipments reaching 2.6GWh, a year-on-year increase of 206% compared to last year, firmly supporting the substantial growth in the company's performance.
Source：EnergyTrend