Let's Work on Our TAN for Summer

Housed in the TAN sector ETF, solar stocks have quietly been outperforming most energy and materials names of late. 

In particular, Sunrun (RUN) out of San Francisco and Israel's SolarEdge (SEDG) seem to be the two standouts, with both stock charts on a tear since the second week of February with no signs of slowing down. The fact that RUN and SEDG also largely ignored the broad market selling we saw last week is another boost to the bull case. And this morning, both RUN and SEDG and green and basically hovering near all-time (SEDG) or multi-year (RUN) highs. 

With this in mind, the main domestic solar to watch for a catch-up move to RUN SEDG would be Arizona-based First Solar, a fairly visible solar play which has been rather quiet of late. Indeed, momentum solar bulls must have been thrown for a loop when hot China names like JASO JKS YGE got hit in recent months while RUN SEDG caught rotations. 

Either way, on the FSLR weekly chart, below, we can see the significance of clearing $75 for a multi-year long-term breakout higher. There is an argument to be made that FSLR has largely been dead money since 2011, but all of those fits and starts may very well have amounted to a massive base bottom which could easily launch a new bull run for the sector. 

Typically, solars will thrive if oil is, too, as we saw in the first half of 2008. So, as we get closer to summer driving season alongside inflation concerns, we are likely reaching a now-or-never moment for many solars to commence a new sector bull run just when it seems like they fell out of favor with hot money traders who were focused on crypto, pot stocks, etc..