Vestal Point Capital LP Takes Position in Geron Co. (NASDAQ:GERN)

Vestal Point Capital LP purchased a new stake in Geron Co. (NASDAQ:GERN) in the 3rd quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The institutional investor purchased 1,050,000 shares of the biopharmaceutical company’s stock, valued at approximately $4,767,000.

A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its position in shares of Geron by 4.6% in the first quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 29,869,287 shares of the biopharmaceutical company’s stock valued at $98,569,000 after acquiring an additional 1,304,713 shares during the period. CANADA LIFE ASSURANCE Co grew its position in shares of Geron by 12.3% during the 1st quarter. CANADA LIFE ASSURANCE Co now owns 64,438 shares of the biopharmaceutical company’s stock worth $212,000 after purchasing an additional 7,034 shares in the last quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD increased its holdings in shares of Geron by 999.7% during the first quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 2,064,963 shares of the biopharmaceutical company’s stock worth $6,815,000 after purchasing an additional 1,877,184 shares during the period. Teachers Retirement System of The State of Kentucky raised its position in shares of Geron by 23.8% in the first quarter. Teachers Retirement System of The State of Kentucky now owns 305,347 shares of the biopharmaceutical company’s stock valued at $1,008,000 after buying an additional 58,787 shares in the last quarter. Finally, American Trust bought a new stake in shares of Geron in the first quarter valued at approximately $38,000. 73.71% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Geron Stock Up 2.7 %

Shares of GERN opened at $4.17 on Friday. The stock has a market capitalization of $2.52 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of -13.03 and a beta of 0.52. Geron Co. has a 52 week low of $1.64 and a 52 week high of $5.34. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.04, a quick ratio of 2.74 and a current ratio of 2.89. The stock has a fifty day moving average of $4.18 and a 200-day moving average of $4.32.

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

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of research firms have commented on GERN. Wedbush restated an “outperform” rating and set a $8.00 price objective on shares of Geron in a research note on Thursday, August 8th. HC Wainwright assumed coverage on Geron in a research report on Tuesday, November 5th. They issued a “buy” rating and a $8.00 price target on the stock. Needham & Company LLC reaffirmed a “buy” rating and set a $6.00 price objective on shares of Geron in a research report on Friday, August 9th. Leerink Partnrs upgraded shares of Geron to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Monday, September 9th. Finally, StockNews.com upgraded shares of Geron to a “sell” rating in a research report on Monday, August 5th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, one has assigned a hold rating, nine have given a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Geron has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $7.05.

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.