(Yicai) July 30 -- Shares of Chinese mainland-listed inverter makers fell for a second straight trading day after the United States banned imports of new foreign-made power inverters used to connect renewable energy and battery storage systems to electricity grids and data centers.

Sungrow Power Supply [SHE: 300274] finished 2.7 percent lower at CNY103.71 (USD15.35) per share in Shenzhen today, after dropping 4.9 percent yesterday. GoodWe Technologies [SHA: 688390] fell 1.5 percent in Shanghai yesterday, and ended down 3.6 percent at CNY61.50 (USD9.10) today.

On July 28, the US Federal Communications Commission said it was adding “advanced robotic devices,” defined as mobile robots including humanoids and quadrupeds, and connected power inverters to its Covered List, for allegedly “posing unacceptable risks to the national security of the US or the safety and security of US persons.”

Equipment, services, and product categories on the list are barred from receiving FCC authorization for import, marketing, or sale in the country. The ban only applies to new models, and manufacturers can seek Conditional Approval exemption from the Department of War for robots or the Department of Homeland Security for inverters.

About 90 percent of inverters used in public utilities’ solar projects in the US were imported from overseas last year, with the majority of them being made in China, according to a report by global research and consultancy group Wood Mackenzie.

The FCC’s announcement followed media reports on June 30 that the Trump administration was drafting an import ban on Chinese inverters. Hefei-based Sungrow’s stock price plunged nearly 14 percent the next day.

“The inverters the company exports to the US do not have functions of remote upgrade and remote communication and meet US standards,” Sungrow Chairman Cao Renxian told investors on July 15. “The US Department of Energy tested Chinese inverters early this year and did not find any maliciously implanted wireless communication functions.”

Sungrow has been pursuing a globalization strategy in recent years. Its Thai factory is already operational, and the one under construction in Poland is expected to begin output of inverters and energy storage products in the first half of next year, aiming to meet European demand and boost customer confidence, according to Cao.

"Going forward, we’ill deploy overseas production capacity based on the principles of global operations and being closer to our customers,” Cao noted.

Sungrow’s US revenue accounts for 15 percent to 20 percent of its total income, the company said last October. Energy storage inverters in North America have wide gross profit margins, which is why Sungrow’s stock was hit the hardest by the ban.

China’s inverter exports surged 34 percent to USD1.2 billion in June from a year earlier, bringing the total for the first half of the year to USD5.5 billion, up 30 percent from the same period last year, according to data from the General Administration of Customs.

Editor: Futura Costaglione