Corebridge Financial Inc. Decreases Holdings in Geron Co. (NASDAQ:GERN)

Corebridge Financial Inc. reduced its stake in Geron Co. (NASDAQ:GERN) by 5.5% during the fourth quarter, according to its most recent filing with the SEC. The fund owned 294,040 shares of the biopharmaceutical company’s stock after selling 17,126 shares during the quarter. Corebridge Financial Inc.’s holdings in Geron were worth $1,041,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently modified their holdings of the company. State Street Corp lifted its position in shares of Geron by 28.4% during the 3rd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 28,961,671 shares of the biopharmaceutical company’s stock valued at $131,486,000 after buying an additional 6,413,204 shares during the last quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its stake in Geron by 3.4% during the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 33,538,822 shares of the biopharmaceutical company’s stock valued at $118,727,000 after buying an additional 1,088,912 shares during the period. World Investment Advisors LLC grew its holdings in shares of Geron by 10,151.4% during the third quarter. World Investment Advisors LLC now owns 1,029,553 shares of the biopharmaceutical company’s stock worth $4,674,000 after purchasing an additional 1,019,510 shares in the last quarter. Exome Asset Management LLC purchased a new position in Geron in the 3rd quarter worth approximately $4,109,000. Finally, Barclays PLC boosted its holdings in shares of Geron by 114.9% in the 3rd quarter. Barclays PLC now owns 1,299,912 shares of the biopharmaceutical company’s stock worth $5,902,000 after purchasing an additional 694,931 shares in the last quarter. 73.71% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Geron Stock Down 6.1 %

GERN opened at $1.38 on Friday. The stock has a market capitalization of $878.93 million, a price-to-earnings ratio of -4.31 and a beta of 0.54. The firm has a 50 day moving average price of $2.15 and a 200-day moving average price of $3.28. Geron Co. has a twelve month low of $1.33 and a twelve month high of $5.34. The company has a quick ratio of 2.74, a current ratio of 2.89 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.04.

Geron (NASDAQ:GERN) last posted its earnings results on Wednesday, February 26th. The biopharmaceutical company reported ($0.04) earnings per share for the quarter, meeting analysts’ consensus estimates of ($0.04). The company had revenue of $47.54 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $45.29 million. Geron had a negative return on equity of 67.53% and a negative net margin of 682.48%. Equities research analysts forecast that Geron Co. will post -0.25 earnings per share for the current year.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several equities analysts recently commented on GERN shares. Needham & Company LLC reaffirmed a “buy” rating and set a $5.00 target price on shares of Geron in a report on Wednesday, March 12th. HC Wainwright reissued a “neutral” rating on shares of Geron in a research note on Wednesday, March 12th. Barclays reissued an “overweight” rating and issued a $4.00 price target (down from $9.00) on shares of Geron in a research note on Thursday, February 27th. Stifel Nicolaus lowered their price objective on Geron from $8.00 to $4.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, February 27th. Finally, Scotiabank lowered their target price on shares of Geron from $6.00 to $4.00 and set a “sector outperform” rating for the company in a report on Thursday, February 27th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, three have assigned a hold rating, seven have assigned a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the company has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $5.75.

Geron Profile

Geron Corporation, a late-stage clinical biopharmaceutical company, focuses on the development and commercialization of therapeutics for myeloid hematologic malignancies. It develops imetelstat, a telomerase inhibitor that is in Phase 3 clinical trials, which inhibits the uncontrolled proliferation of malignant stem and progenitor cells in myeloid hematologic malignancies for the treatment of low or intermediate-1 risk myelodysplastic syndromes and intermediate-2 or high-risk myelofibrosis.