Geron (NASDAQ:GERN) Shares Gap Up Following Strong Earnings

Geron Corporation (NASDAQ:GERN) gapped up prior to trading on Wednesday following a better than expected earnings announcement. The stock had previously closed at $1.20, but opened at $1.30. Geron shares last traded at $1.32, with a volume of 9,292,837 shares.

The biopharmaceutical company reported ($0.02) EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of ($0.03) by $0.01. The business had revenue of $49.04 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $47.30 million. Geron had a negative return on equity of 47.86% and a negative net margin of 119.54%. Geron’s revenue was up 5455.6% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter last year, the firm posted ($0.10) earnings per share.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several analysts have recently commented on the company. The Goldman Sachs Group assumed coverage on Geron in a research report on Thursday, July 10th. They issued a “sell” rating and a $1.00 target price for the company. Scotiabank lowered Geron from a “sector outperform” rating to a “sector perform” rating and cut their price objective for the stock from $4.00 to $1.50 in a report on Thursday, May 8th. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, three have issued a hold rating, five have issued a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Geron presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $4.61.

Institutional Trading of Geron

Several hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of the company. RA Capital Management L.P. raised its holdings in shares of Geron by 101.2% during the first quarter. RA Capital Management L.P. now owns 60,379,366 shares of the biopharmaceutical company’s stock worth $96,003,000 after acquiring an additional 30,369,830 shares in the last quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. raised its holdings in Geron by 1.8% during the first quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 34,146,851 shares of the biopharmaceutical company’s stock valued at $54,293,000 after buying an additional 608,029 shares in the last quarter. Janus Henderson Group PLC raised its holdings in Geron by 20.0% during the fourth quarter. Janus Henderson Group PLC now owns 27,082,461 shares of the biopharmaceutical company’s stock valued at $95,769,000 after buying an additional 4,516,615 shares in the last quarter. Vestal Point Capital LP raised its holdings in Geron by 100.0% during the first quarter. Vestal Point Capital LP now owns 22,005,340 shares of the biopharmaceutical company’s stock valued at $34,988,000 after buying an additional 11,005,340 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Wellington Management Group LLP raised its holdings in Geron by 6.7% during the fourth quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP now owns 13,510,114 shares of the biopharmaceutical company’s stock valued at $47,826,000 after buying an additional 847,710 shares in the last quarter. 73.71% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Geron Trading Up 15.4%

The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.44, a current ratio of 7.87 and a quick ratio of 6.97. The company has a fifty day simple moving average of $1.40 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $1.70. The company has a market capitalization of $882.13 million, a P/E ratio of -6.59 and a beta of 0.73.

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.