Traders Purchase High Volume of Put Options on Prothena (NASDAQ:PRTA)

Prothena Co. plc (NASDAQ:PRTA) was the recipient of unusually large options trading on Tuesday. Traders purchased 8,185 put options on the company. This represents an increase of 1,210% compared to the typical volume of 625 put options.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several brokerages recently weighed in on PRTA. Piper Sandler dropped their target price on Prothena from $110.00 to $81.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a report on Tuesday. JMP Securities dropped their target price on Prothena from $78.00 to $29.00 and set a “market outperform” rating for the company in a report on Tuesday. Jefferies Financial Group cut Prothena from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating and set a $6.00 target price for the company. in a report on Tuesday. Cantor Fitzgerald cut Prothena from an “overweight” rating to a “neutral” rating in a report on Tuesday. Finally, HC Wainwright dropped their price objective on Prothena from $30.00 to $14.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a report on Tuesday. Six analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and four have issued a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $31.50.

Prothena Stock Performance

NASDAQ:PRTA opened at $4.58 on Wednesday. The stock has a 50-day simple moving average of $9.38 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $12.72. Prothena has a 52-week low of $4.45 and a 52-week high of $25.42. The firm has a market capitalization of $246.53 million, a PE ratio of -1.99 and a beta of 0.11.

Prothena (NASDAQ:PRTA) last released its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, May 8th. The biotechnology company reported ($1.12) earnings per share for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of ($0.92) by ($0.20). The business had revenue of $2.83 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $8.18 million. Prothena had a negative return on equity of 22.67% and a negative net margin of 90.50%. The business’s revenue was up 5500.0% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the company earned ($1.34) EPS. Equities analysts forecast that Prothena will post -4.04 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Prothena

Hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in the company. Virtus ETF Advisers LLC lifted its position in shares of Prothena by 19.3% in the fourth quarter. Virtus ETF Advisers LLC now owns 5,148 shares of the biotechnology company’s stock worth $71,000 after buying an additional 833 shares in the last quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC raised its position in Prothena by 4,626.0% during the first quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 6,002 shares of the biotechnology company’s stock valued at $74,000 after purchasing an additional 5,875 shares during the period. Headlands Technologies LLC raised its position in Prothena by 196.5% during the fourth quarter. Headlands Technologies LLC now owns 7,330 shares of the biotechnology company’s stock valued at $102,000 after purchasing an additional 4,858 shares during the period. Cambridge Investment Research Advisors Inc. purchased a new stake in Prothena during the first quarter valued at approximately $126,000. Finally, Teacher Retirement System of Texas purchased a new stake in Prothena during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $145,000. 97.08% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Prothena Company Profile

Prothena Corporation plc, a late-stage clinical biotechnology company, focuses on discovery and development of novel therapies to treat diseases caused by protein dysregulation in the United States. The company is involved in developing birtamimab, an investigational humanized antibody that is in Phase III clinical trial for the treatment of AL amyloidosis; Prasinezumab, a humanized monoclonal antibody, for the treatment of Parkinson’s disease and other related synucleinopathies which is in Phase IIb clinical trial; NNC6019 that is in Phase lI clinical trial for the treatment of ATTR amyloidosis; and BMS-986446 and PRX012, which is in Phase I clinical trial for the treatment of Alzheimer’s disease.