Bank of America Corp DE Boosts Stock Position in Geron Co. (NASDAQ:GERN)

Bank of America Corp DE lifted its holdings in shares of Geron Co. (NASDAQ:GERN) by 47.8% in the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The firm owned 3,900,627 shares of the biopharmaceutical company’s stock after buying an additional 1,262,072 shares during the quarter. Bank of America Corp DE owned approximately 0.65% of Geron worth $13,808,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently made changes to their positions in the company. SBI Securities Co. Ltd. purchased a new stake in Geron in the 4th quarter worth $28,000. Integrated Wealth Concepts LLC purchased a new position in Geron during the fourth quarter valued at $36,000. Fifth Lane Capital LP acquired a new stake in shares of Geron in the fourth quarter valued at about $53,000. Harvest Investment Services LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Geron during the fourth quarter worth about $61,000. Finally, Jump Financial LLC acquired a new position in shares of Geron during the 4th quarter worth about $70,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 73.71% of the company’s stock.

Geron Stock Performance

Shares of Geron stock opened at $1.34 on Thursday. The business’s 50 day moving average price is $1.43 and its 200 day moving average price is $2.58. The company has a market cap of $853.47 million, a price-to-earnings ratio of -4.19 and a beta of 0.76. 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 Co. has a one year low of $1.17 and a one year high of $5.34.

Geron (NASDAQ:GERN) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, May 7th. The biopharmaceutical company reported ($0.03) EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of ($0.04) by $0.01. Geron had a negative return on equity of 67.53% and a negative net margin of 682.48%. The business had revenue of $39.60 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $49.88 million. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm earned ($0.07) EPS. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 12927.3% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, research analysts predict that Geron Co. will post -0.25 EPS for the current year.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

GERN has been the topic of several research analyst reports. Needham & Company LLC reiterated a “buy” rating and issued a $5.00 price objective on shares of Geron in a report on Wednesday, March 12th. Stifel Nicolaus lowered their price target on Geron from $8.00 to $4.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research note on Thursday, February 27th. B. Riley downgraded Geron from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating and reduced their price objective for the company from $3.50 to $2.00 in a research note on Thursday, February 27th. HC Wainwright restated a “neutral” rating on shares of Geron in a report on Wednesday, March 12th. Finally, Scotiabank lowered shares of Geron from a “sector outperform” rating to a “sector perform” rating and dropped their target price for the stock from $4.00 to $1.50 in a report on Thursday, May 8th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, three have given a hold rating, five have given a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $5.06.

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.