Hennion & Walsh Asset Management Inc. Increases Stake in Geron Co. (NASDAQ:GERN)

Hennion & Walsh Asset Management Inc. boosted its holdings in Geron Co. (NASDAQ:GERN) by 34.7% in the 3rd quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 341,884 shares of the biopharmaceutical company’s stock after purchasing an additional 88,027 shares during the period. Hennion & Walsh Asset Management Inc. owned approximately 0.06% of Geron worth $1,552,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Several other institutional investors have also added to or reduced their stakes in the business. Darwin Global Management Ltd. bought a new stake in shares of Geron in the 2nd quarter valued at about $106,185,000. Tokio Marine Asset Management Co. Ltd. bought a new stake in Geron in the first quarter valued at approximately $333,000. Renaissance Technologies LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Geron during the second quarter valued at approximately $3,315,000. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD grew its holdings in shares of Geron by 999.7% in 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 last quarter. Finally, Algert Global LLC purchased a new position in shares of Geron in the second quarter worth $539,000. 73.71% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of equities research analysts have issued reports on GERN shares. Scotiabank assumed coverage on shares of Geron in a report on Wednesday, October 16th. They issued a “sector outperform” rating and a $6.00 price target on the stock. Leerink Partners initiated coverage on Geron in a research report on Monday, September 9th. They set an “outperform” rating and a $7.00 price target for the company. StockNews.com upgraded Geron to a “sell” rating in a research report on Monday, August 5th. Needham & Company LLC restated a “buy” rating and set a $6.00 target price on shares of Geron in a report on Friday, August 9th. Finally, Leerink Partnrs raised Geron to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Monday, September 9th. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, one has issued a hold rating, eight have given a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Geron has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $6.94.

Geron Price Performance

Shares of GERN stock opened at $4.06 on Friday. The company has a quick ratio of 3.60, a current ratio of 3.61 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.12. The stock has a market cap of $2.45 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of -11.28 and a beta of 0.50. The business’s fifty day moving average is $4.38 and its 200 day moving average is $4.27. Geron Co. has a twelve month low of $1.64 and a twelve month high of $5.34.

Geron (NASDAQ:GERN) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, August 8th. The biopharmaceutical company reported ($0.10) earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, hitting the consensus estimate of ($0.10). Geron had a negative net margin of 15,990.68% and a negative return on equity of 73.79%. The company had revenue of $0.88 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $0.34 million. During the same period last year, the business earned ($0.09) EPS. Geron’s quarterly revenue was up 2941.4% compared to the same quarter last year. Research analysts expect that Geron Co. will post -0.34 EPS for the current fiscal 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.