Geron’s (GERN) “Buy” Rating Reiterated at Needham & Company LLC

Geron (NASDAQ:GERN)‘s stock had its “buy” rating reiterated by stock analysts at Needham & Company LLC in a report released on Friday,Benzinga reports. They presently have a $6.00 price objective on the biopharmaceutical company’s stock. Needham & Company LLC’s price objective would suggest a potential upside of 55.44% from the company’s previous close.

A number of other analysts have also recently issued reports on the stock. HC Wainwright restated a “buy” rating and set a $9.00 target price on shares of Geron in a research note on Tuesday, December 10th. Scotiabank started coverage on shares of Geron in a research report on Wednesday, October 16th. They set a “sector outperform” rating and a $6.00 price objective for the company. Leerink Partners began coverage on Geron in a research report on Monday, September 9th. They issued an “outperform” rating and a $7.00 target price on the stock. Barclays raised Geron to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Friday, November 29th. Finally, Leerink Partnrs raised Geron to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Monday, September 9th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, one has issued a hold rating, eight have given a buy rating and two have assigned a strong buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, Geron currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $7.15.

Geron Trading Down 1.5 %

Geron stock opened at $3.86 on Friday. The stock has a 50-day simple moving average of $4.07 and a 200 day simple moving average of $4.35. The stock has a market capitalization of $2.33 billion, a P/E ratio of -12.06 and a beta of 0.51. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.04, a quick ratio of 2.74 and a current ratio of 2.89. Geron has a 52 week low of $1.64 and a 52 week high of $5.34.

Geron (NASDAQ:GERN) last issued its earnings results on Thursday, November 7th. The biopharmaceutical company reported ($0.04) EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of ($0.09) by $0.05. Geron had a negative return on equity of 67.53% and a negative net margin of 682.48%. The company had revenue of $28.27 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $18.97 million. During the same period in the previous year, the company posted ($0.08) EPS. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 17138.4% compared to the same quarter last year. Analysts expect that Geron will post -0.25 earnings per share for the current year.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Geron

Institutional investors and hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of the company. Exome Asset Management LLC acquired a new position in shares of Geron in the 3rd quarter valued at approximately $4,109,000. Alternative Investment Advisors LLC. increased its stake in Geron by 13.3% in the third quarter. Alternative Investment Advisors LLC. now owns 22,209 shares of the biopharmaceutical company’s stock valued at $101,000 after acquiring an additional 2,612 shares during the last quarter. Franklin Resources Inc. raised its position in Geron by 461.4% during the third quarter. Franklin Resources Inc. now owns 79,923 shares of the biopharmaceutical company’s stock valued at $331,000 after purchasing an additional 65,687 shares in the last quarter. World Investment Advisors LLC lifted its stake in 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 during the last quarter. Finally, Geode Capital Management LLC boosted its holdings in shares of Geron by 1.8% in the 3rd quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 13,067,999 shares of the biopharmaceutical company’s stock valued at $59,339,000 after purchasing an additional 231,178 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors own 73.71% of the company’s stock.

Geron Company 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.