Australian CleanTech Index performance - Q1

The ACT Australian CleanTech Index just outperformed both the S&P ASX200 and the S&P ASX Small Ordinaries for the month of September 2013 and over the first quarter of FY14.

The ACT Australian CleanTech Index rose from 34.5 to 35.4 over the month of September recording a 2.7 per cent gain. This compared to the S&P ASX200 gain of 1.6 per cent and the S&P ASX Small Ordinaries Index gain of 0.8 per cent.

The Australian CleanTech 20 had a slightly better performance with a gain of 3 per cent. Over the first quarter of the 2014 fiscal year, the ACT Australian CleanTech Index also outperformed its benchmarks and recorded a healthy gain of 14.4 per cent, ahead of the S&P ASX200's gain of 8.7 per cent and the S&P ASX Small Ordinaries' 13.5 per cent gain. The Australian CleanTech 20 underperformed the wider index over the quarter with a gain of 13.6 per cent.

The market capitalisation of the 70 stocks in the ACT Australian CleanTech Index is $9.3 billion, before its rebalance, falling from its peak of $16.3 billion in July 2007.

Best and worst stocks

The best and worst performers in terms of share price performance over the month, and the first quarter of the 2014 fiscal year are shown in the table below. With 14 companies having gains of over 40 per cent over the quarter, the Index has shown a robust performance across a wide variety of stocks.

Index rebalance

The ACT Australian CleanTech Index underwent its quarterly rebalancing at the end of September which took account of recent share issues and other corporate activity. The changes that were made to the index constituents at this rebalancing were:

Additions to the index:

– Leaf Energy Ltd (ASX:LER) is researching, developing and commercialising plant based technologies and products for the biofuel, industrial and medical research markets. Its Glycerol Pretreatment process will be commercialised in 2014. Leaf Energy has Australasian rights to the Glycerol Pretreatment process that was developed by the researchers at the Queensland University of Technology. This process has already shown impressive results in the laboratory compared to the current state of the art processes being utilised in the planned new commercial facilities around the world. The impressive pretreatment results have been evaluated on a larger scale at the Mackay Renewable Biocommodities Pilot Plant. www.leafenergy.com.au

Removal from the index:

– Genesis R&D Ltd (ASX:GEN) following its delisting from the ASX.

– Medivac Ltd (ASX:MDV) following the sale of its assets to RR Taylor Ltd.

– Raya Group (ASX:RYG) formally Panax Geothermal following the selling down of its Indonesian geothermal assets and refocusing on resources and oil and gas projects.

Component sub-indices

To provide an analysis of the ACT Australian CleanTech Index, eight sub-indices have been developed. The performance of each of these sub-indices over the last six financial years and during 1Q of FY14 is shown in the table and charts below. The best performing sectors for the three months to September 2013 were ACT Environment Index and the ACT Solar Index. The worst performer was the ACT Biofuel Index.

*ACT Wind Index discontinued on July 1, 2011 due to too few companies.

Component Companies on September 30, 2013

The 20 largest index constituents by market capitalisation on September 30 are provided in the table below. These companies will form the constituents of the Australian CleanTech 20 until the index is rebalanced again on 31 December 2013.

Those companies joining the Australian CleanTech 20 going forward are: Dyesol and Geodynamics replacing Galaxy Resources and Wasabi Energy.

For a full listing of all companies included in the ACT Australian CleanTech Index, please email your request to index@auscleantech.com.au.