Geron (NASDAQ:GERN) Stock Price Up 4.3% – Should You Buy?

Geron Co. (NASDAQ:GERN) shares rose 4.3% during trading on Friday . The stock traded as high as $1.84 and last traded at $1.83. Approximately 9,915,648 shares traded hands during mid-day trading, a decline of 9% from the average daily volume of 10,848,446 shares. The stock had previously closed at $1.75.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

GERN has been the topic of several recent analyst reports. B. Riley downgraded Geron from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating and reduced their target price for the stock from $3.50 to $2.00 in a report on Thursday, February 27th. Stifel Nicolaus reduced their target price on Geron from $8.00 to $4.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, February 27th. HC Wainwright reissued a “neutral” rating on shares of Geron in a report on Wednesday, March 12th. Needham & Company LLC reissued a “buy” rating and issued a $5.00 target price on shares of Geron in a report on Wednesday, March 12th. Finally, Scotiabank dropped their price objective on shares of Geron from $6.00 to $4.00 and set a “sector outperform” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, February 27th. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, three have issued a hold rating, seven have issued a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $5.75.

Geron Stock Up 4.0 %

The firm’s 50-day simple moving average is $2.42 and its 200 day simple moving average is $3.47. The company has a market cap of $1.16 billion, a P/E ratio of -5.69 and a beta of 0.53. 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 (NASDAQ:GERN) last issued its earnings results on Wednesday, February 26th. The biopharmaceutical company reported ($0.04) EPS for the quarter, meeting the consensus estimate of ($0.04). The company had revenue of $47.54 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $45.29 million. Geron had a negative net margin of 682.48% and a negative return on equity of 67.53%. On average, research analysts forecast that Geron Co. will post -0.25 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Geron

Institutional investors and hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in the company. RTW Investments LP acquired a new position in shares of Geron in the 3rd quarter valued at $200,268,000. Nvest Financial LLC acquired a new position in shares of Geron in the 4th quarter valued at $693,000. Janus Henderson Group PLC grew its holdings in shares of Geron by 140.0% in the 3rd quarter. Janus Henderson Group PLC now owns 22,565,846 shares of the biopharmaceutical company’s stock valued at $102,193,000 after buying an additional 13,163,889 shares during the period. Barclays PLC grew 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 valued at $5,902,000 after buying an additional 694,931 shares during the period. Finally, Intech Investment Management LLC acquired a new position in shares of Geron in the 3rd quarter valued at $1,102,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds 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.