Trina Solar

Business

Trina Solar (天合光能股份有限公司) has four businesses: solar products, mainly modules; storage; system solutions, which include solar trackers, distributed systems and utility-scale plants; and digital energy services such as plant operation and power generation (2026 interim report, pp. 9, 10). Its main module technology is TOPCon, with back-contact modules for rooftops; a tandem module it developed reached 907 W and 29.2% efficiency (p. 10). It says Wood Mackenzie ranks it second worldwide among tracker makers (p. 11), and its distributed solar unit has supplied systems to more than 1.5 million households (p. 11).

Results in the first half of 2026

• Revenue rose 2.99% to ¥31.99bn. The net loss attributable to shareholders narrowed to ¥270m from ¥2.92bn, but excluding non-recurring items it lost ¥2.89bn, against ¥2.96bn. Operating cash flow was ¥5.07bn (p. 7).
• Module shipments exceeded 25 GW. Storage shipments exceeded 5 GWh, up 188%, and the storage business was profitable for the half (pp. 10, 14).
• By business: solar products brought in ¥17.79bn, 56% of revenue, at a gross margin of about 1.3%; storage ¥2.47bn at about 21.0%; system solutions ¥9.60bn at about 8.1%; and digital energy services ¥1.10bn at about 52%. Overseas sales were about 54% of revenue (our calculations from p. 206).

The T1 Energy gains

Most of the improvement came from one holding. Trina sold part of its shares in T1 Energy Inc., a solar maker based in Austin, Texas (T1 Energy), and booked a large gain on the rest: investment income was ¥558m, mainly from the sale, and fair-value gains were ¥2.14bn, mainly from revaluing the remaining shares (p. 30). It now carries the remaining stake as a financial asset, since it no longer has significant influence over T1 Energy (p. 34). It sold T1 Energy ¥990m of goods and received ¥59m of trademark and patent fees in the first half of 2025, but recorded no such sales or fees in the first half of 2026 (pp. 238, 239).

Our view: Trina's half shows where profit in the chain has moved. Storage and services earned money while modules, still more than half of revenue, barely covered their costs, and the headline improvement came from a share holding rather than from operations.

The company's own caveats

• Losses. It is still losing money because of oversupply and competition, though less than a year earlier (p. 28).
• Technology. It could fall behind if a better and cheaper cell technology emerges (p. 28).
• Prices. Polysilicon, freight and module prices can swing with supply and demand (p. 28).
• Balance sheet. Receivables are large, its debt ratio has risen, and the shift to n-type could impair older p-type lines (pp. 28, 29).