Graham Capital Management L.P. Takes $599,000 Position in Geron Corporation $GERN

Key Points

• Graham Capital Management L.P. acquired 376,760 shares of Geron Corporation, valued at approximately $599,000, during the first quarter, representing about 0.06% of the company.
• Institutional ownership of Geron Corporation is significant, with 73.71% of the stock owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.
• Wall Street analysts give Geron a consensus rating of "Moderate Buy" with an average target price of $4.19, despite a recent "sell" rating from Goldman Sachs.

Graham Capital Management L.P. purchased a new position in shares of Geron Corporation (NASDAQ:GERN - Free Report) during the first quarter, according to its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The institutional investor purchased 376,760 shares of the biopharmaceutical company's stock, valued at approximately $599,000. Graham Capital Management L.P. owned 0.06% of Geron at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds have also made changes to their positions in the company. GF Fund Management CO. LTD. acquired a new stake in shares of Geron during the 4th quarter worth approximately $45,000. 111 Capital bought a new stake in shares of Geron during the 4th quarter worth $52,000. Crestline Management LP bought a new stake in shares of Geron during the 4th quarter worth $64,000. Frisch Financial Group Inc. boosted its stake in shares of Geron by 84.3% during the 1st quarter. Frisch Financial Group Inc. now owns 19,025 shares of the biopharmaceutical company's stock worth $30,000 after acquiring an additional 8,700 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Lazard Asset Management LLC bought a new stake in shares of Geron during the 4th quarter worth $89,000. 73.71% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Separately, The Goldman Sachs Group assumed coverage on Geron in a research note on Thursday, July 10th. They set a "sell" rating and a $1.00 price objective for the company. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, three have given a Hold rating and one has given a Sell rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has an average rating of "Hold" and an average price target of $3.79.

Geron Stock Down 0.7%

Shares of GERN traded down $0.01 during mid-day trading on Tuesday, reaching $1.36. The company's stock had a trading volume of 4,671,305 shares, compared to its average volume of 12,145,966. The business has a fifty day moving average of $1.34 and a 200 day moving average of $1.45. The company has a market cap of $867.70 million, a price-to-earnings ratio of -10.46 and a beta of 0.63. Geron Corporation has a 1 year low of $1.09 and a 1 year high of $4.83. The company has a quick ratio of 6.79, a current ratio of 7.87 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.46.

Geron (NASDAQ:GERN - Get Free Report) last released its earnings results on Wednesday, August 6th. The biopharmaceutical company reported ($0.02) earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts' consensus estimates of ($0.03) by $0.01. The company had revenue of $49.04 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $47.30 million. Geron had a negative return on equity of 31.37% and a negative net margin of 53.52%.The company's revenue for the quarter was up 5455.6% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company earned ($0.10) earnings per share. As a group, analysts forecast that Geron Corporation will post -0.25 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

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.