Geron (NASDAQ:GERN) Cut to “Neutral” at HC Wainwright

Geron (NASDAQ:GERN) was downgraded by investment analysts at HC Wainwright from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating in a research note issued to investors on Wednesday, MarketBeat Ratings reports.

Other equities analysts have also recently issued reports about the company. Needham & Company LLC boosted their target price on Geron from $6.00 to $7.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Monday, January 13th. B. Riley cut their price target on shares of Geron from $5.50 to $3.50 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a report on Tuesday, February 18th. Finally, Barclays upgraded shares of Geron to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Friday, November 29th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, three have assigned a hold rating, eight have assigned a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $5.68.

Geron Trading Up 8.1 %

Shares of GERN opened at $1.74 on Wednesday. The stock has a market capitalization of $1.05 billion, a P/E ratio of -5.44 and a beta of 0.53. Geron has a twelve month low of $1.46 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. The firm has a fifty day simple moving average of $2.97 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $3.80.

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

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Geron

Several hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of GERN. RTW Investments LP bought a new position in Geron during the 3rd quarter valued at approximately $200,268,000. Holocene Advisors LP purchased a new stake in shares of Geron in the third quarter worth $82,498,000. Janus Henderson Group PLC increased its holdings in shares of Geron by 140.0% during the third quarter. Janus Henderson Group PLC now owns 22,565,846 shares of the biopharmaceutical company’s stock valued at $102,193,000 after acquiring an additional 13,163,889 shares in the last quarter. Vestal Point Capital LP boosted its stake in Geron by 947.6% in the 4th quarter. Vestal Point Capital LP now owns 11,000,000 shares of the biopharmaceutical company’s stock worth $38,940,000 after purchasing an additional 9,950,000 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Braidwell LP purchased a new stake in Geron during the 4th quarter valued at about $24,802,000. Institutional investors own 73.71% of the company’s stock.

About Geron

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.