Geron Co. (NASDAQ:GERN) Receives Consensus Rating of “Buy” from Analysts

Shares of Geron Co. (NASDAQ:GERN) have received a consensus rating of “Buy” from the eleven research firms that are presently covering the stock, MarketBeat.com reports. One research analyst has rated the stock with a hold recommendation, eight have issued a buy recommendation and two have assigned a strong buy recommendation to the company. The average 12 month target price among brokerages that have issued a report on the stock in the last year is $7.25.

GERN has been the topic of several recent research reports. HC Wainwright reaffirmed a “buy” rating and issued a $9.00 price objective on shares of Geron in a research note on Tuesday, December 10th. Scotiabank assumed coverage on shares of Geron in a report on Wednesday, October 16th. They set a “sector outperform” rating and a $6.00 price objective for the company. Needham & Company LLC lifted their price objective on Geron from $6.00 to $7.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Monday, January 13th. Finally, Barclays upgraded Geron to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Friday, November 29th.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Geron

Several large investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in GERN. Readystate Asset Management LP bought a new position in shares of Geron in the 3rd quarter worth $58,000. Rovin Capital UT ADV acquired a new position in shares of Geron during the third quarter worth $62,000. Empowered Funds LLC acquired a new stake in Geron in the third quarter worth about $67,000. Inspire Advisors LLC acquired a new stake in Geron during the 3rd quarter worth about $68,000. Finally, Monterey Private Wealth Inc. acquired a new stake in shares of Geron in the fourth quarter worth $63,000. 73.71% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Geron Stock Performance

GERN stock opened at $3.01 on Tuesday. The company has a current ratio of 2.89, a quick ratio of 2.74 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.04. Geron has a 12-month low of $1.64 and a 12-month high of $5.34. The stock has a market capitalization of $1.82 billion, a PE ratio of -9.41 and a beta of 0.55. The stock’s 50 day simple moving average is $3.59 and its 200 day simple moving average is $4.12.

Geron (NASDAQ:GERN) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, November 7th. The biopharmaceutical company reported ($0.04) EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of ($0.09) by $0.05. The company had revenue of $28.27 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $18.97 million. Geron had a negative return on equity of 67.53% and a negative net margin of 682.48%. Geron’s revenue for the quarter was up 17138.4% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business earned ($0.08) earnings per share. As a group, research analysts forecast that Geron will post -0.25 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

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.