China-based PV manufacturer Yingli Green Energy has been hit by all four of its independent directors resigning their positions, effective 6 March 2020.
In a financial filing, Yingli Green did not provide any reasons for the resignations of three of the four departing independent directors, including Mr. Ming Huang, Mr. Zheng Xue and Mr. Junmin Liu.
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Huang and Xue had sat on Yingli Green’s audit committee, compensation committee and the special committee. The latter of the three committees was dealing with the long outstanding bond defaults and restructuring efforts by the company, which remains technically bankrupt.
Meanwhile, however, Yingli Green cited personal reasons for the resignation of Iain Ferguson Bruce, the chairperson of the audit committee, compensation committee and the special committee.
In a revised financial filing, Yingli Green explained that its entire board of directors (three) had “assumed all of the responsibilities previously assigned to the audit committee, compensation committee and special committee.”
“However, the Company’s current board of directors do not include any independent members and each director is also an executive officer of the Company,” the company went on to say. “As such, the Company’s current board of directors may not be able to perform the functions previously assigned to its audit committee, compensation committee or special committee as properly as performed by independent directors.”
Yingli Green previously reported 2018 full-year revenue of US$648.1 million, down from US$1.28 billion in 2017, a 49% year-on-year decline. For their part, PV module shipments (mainly in China) declined from 2,953MW in 2017 to 1,731MW in 2018, a fall of almost 40% year-on-year.
The result was a net loss of US$240.6 million, compared to a net loss of US$530.3 million in 2017. In 2018, gross profit margin decreased to a negative 6.2%.
The financial results recorded total debts of over US$2.3 billion at the end of 2018.