BioCryst Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ:BCRX) Earns "Buy" Rating from Needham & Company LLC

Key Points

• Needham reaffirmed its “Buy” rating on BioCryst Pharmaceuticals and set a $16 price target, implying 72.51% upside from the prior close.
• Analyst sentiment remains favorable, with eight Buy ratings and four Holds, producing a consensus “Moderate Buy” rating and average target price of $20.60.
• BioCryst reported quarterly EPS of $0.30 versus the $0.15 consensus estimate, while revenue rose 33.6% year over year to $218.25 million; institutional investors own 85.88% of the stock.

BioCryst Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ:BCRX - Get Free Report)'s stock had its "buy" rating reaffirmed by equities researchers at Needham & Company LLC in a research note issued on Tuesday, Benzinga reports. They presently have a $16.00 price objective on the biotechnology company's stock. Needham & Company LLC's target price would indicate a potential upside of 72.51% from the company's previous close.

BCRX has been the subject of a number of other reports. JPMorgan Chase & Co. started coverage on shares of BioCryst Pharmaceuticals in a research report on Monday, July 13th. They set a "neutral" rating and a $12.00 price target for the company. Wedbush cut their price objective on shares of BioCryst Pharmaceuticals from $21.00 to $20.00 and set an "outperform" rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, August 6th. HC Wainwright reaffirmed a "buy" rating and set a $32.00 target price on shares of BioCryst Pharmaceuticals in a research note on Tuesday, June 30th. Wall Street Zen lowered shares of BioCryst Pharmaceuticals from a "strong-buy" rating to a "buy" rating in a report on Saturday, August 29th. Finally, Royal Bank Of Canada dropped their price target on BioCryst Pharmaceuticals from $14.00 to $13.00 and set an "outperform" rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, August 6th. Eight equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and four have issued a Hold rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, BioCryst Pharmaceuticals has an average rating of "Moderate Buy" and a consensus target price of $20.60.

BioCryst Pharmaceuticals Stock Performance

Shares of NASDAQ BCRX traded down $0.69 during mid-day trading on Tuesday, hitting $9.28. 6,755,851 shares of the stock traded hands, compared to its average volume of 4,759,003. BioCryst Pharmaceuticals has a 52 week low of $6.00 and a 52 week high of $11.22. The company has a market cap of $2.37 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of -6.16 and a beta of 0.57. The stock has a fifty day moving average price of $9.75 and a 200-day moving average price of $9.20.

BioCryst Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ:BCRX - Get Free Report) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, August 5th. The biotechnology company reported $0.30 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts' consensus estimates of $0.15 by $0.15. BioCryst Pharmaceuticals had a negative return on equity of 86.89% and a negative net margin of 40.90%.The business had revenue of $218.25 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $183.28 million. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company earned $0.15 earnings per share. The firm's quarterly revenue was up 33.6% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, sell-side analysts predict that BioCryst Pharmaceuticals will post -2.25 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Several hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in BCRX. BlackRock Inc. bought a new position in BioCryst Pharmaceuticals in the 2nd quarter valued at approximately $238,930,000. RA Capital Management L.P. bought a new stake in shares of BioCryst Pharmaceuticals during the 4th quarter valued at about $123,452,000. Deerfield Management Company L.P. increased its holdings in BioCryst Pharmaceuticals by 159.4% during the third quarter. Deerfield Management Company L.P. now owns 12,169,000 shares of the biotechnology company's stock valued at $92,363,000 after buying an additional 7,477,000 shares during the last quarter. State Street Corp raised its holdings in BioCryst Pharmaceuticals by 12.9% in the 4th quarter. State Street Corp now owns 11,073,211 shares of the biotechnology company's stock worth $86,371,000 after purchasing an additional 1,265,773 shares during the period. Finally, Jupiter Topco LLC bought a new position in shares of BioCryst Pharmaceuticals in the second quarter worth about $95,268,000. Institutional investors own 85.88% of the company's stock.

BioCryst Pharmaceuticals Company Profile

BioCryst Pharmaceuticals, Inc is a clinical‐stage biotechnology company headquartered in Durham, North Carolina, that focuses on the discovery and development of novel, oral small‐molecule medicines for rare and serious diseases. Since its founding in 1986, the company has leveraged structure‐based drug design to advance a pipeline of targeted therapeutics designed to address underlying disease mechanisms rather than just treat symptoms.

The company's first commercial product, Orladeyo (berotralstat), is an oral kallikrein inhibitor approved for the prophylactic treatment of hereditary angioedema (HAE) in both the United States and Europe.

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