Russell Investments Group Ltd. Lowers Stake in Geron Co. (NASDAQ:GERN)

Russell Investments Group Ltd. lessened its holdings in Geron Co. (NASDAQ:GERN) by 8.9% during the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the SEC. The firm owned 2,267,808 shares of the biopharmaceutical company’s stock after selling 221,453 shares during the quarter. Russell Investments Group Ltd. owned about 0.38% of Geron worth $8,028,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds have also made changes to their positions in the company. State Street Corp boosted its position in shares of Geron by 28.4% in the 3rd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 28,961,671 shares of the biopharmaceutical company’s stock worth $131,486,000 after purchasing an additional 6,413,204 shares in the last quarter. Segall Bryant & Hamill LLC boosted its holdings in Geron by 82.6% in the fourth quarter. Segall Bryant & Hamill LLC now owns 7,446,275 shares of the biopharmaceutical company’s stock worth $26,360,000 after acquiring an additional 3,369,196 shares in the last quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. grew its stake in shares of Geron by 3.4% in the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 33,538,822 shares of the biopharmaceutical company’s stock worth $118,727,000 after acquiring an additional 1,088,912 shares during the last quarter. World Investment Advisors LLC increased 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 valued at $4,674,000 after acquiring an additional 1,019,510 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Exome Asset Management LLC purchased a new position in shares of Geron in the 3rd quarter worth about $4,109,000. Institutional investors own 73.71% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

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

Geron Stock Performance

Shares of Geron stock opened at $1.38 on Friday. The firm has a market capitalization of $878.93 million, a P/E ratio of -4.31 and a beta of 0.66. Geron Co. has a 52 week low of $1.19 and a 52 week 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 company has a 50 day moving average price of $1.93 and a 200 day moving average price of $3.13.

Geron (NASDAQ:GERN) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, February 26th. The biopharmaceutical company reported ($0.04) earnings per share for the quarter, meeting the consensus estimate of ($0.04). The business 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%. Sell-side analysts expect that Geron Co. will post -0.25 EPS for the current year.

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.