Pictet Asset Management Holding SA Sells 455,809 Shares of BioCryst Pharmaceuticals, Inc. $BCRX

Key Points

• Pictet Asset Management cut its stake in BioCryst by 38.1%, selling 455,809 shares and reducing its holding to 740,510 shares worth about $5.71 million at the end of the quarter.
• Insider Alane P. Barnes sold 150,000 shares at an average price of $9.15 for roughly $1.37 million, reducing her direct ownership by 27.24% to 400,703 shares.
• BioCryst beat expectations with quarterly EPS of $1.12 (vs. $0.07 estimate) and revenue of $163.3 million, up 209% YoY, while analysts maintain a "Moderate Buy" consensus with a $19.64 average target.

Pictet Asset Management Holding SA cut its stake in BioCryst Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (NASDAQ:BCRX - Free Report) by 38.1% during the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The fund owned 740,510 shares of the biotechnology company's stock after selling 455,809 shares during the period. Pictet Asset Management Holding SA owned about 0.35% of BioCryst Pharmaceuticals worth $5,712,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other hedge funds have also recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Vanguard Group Inc. grew its holdings in shares of BioCryst Pharmaceuticals by 2.2% in the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 22,273,375 shares of the biotechnology company's stock worth $173,732,000 after purchasing an additional 482,494 shares during the last quarter. Deerfield Management Company L.P. grew its holdings in BioCryst Pharmaceuticals by 159.4% during the 3rd quarter. Deerfield Management Company L.P. now owns 12,169,000 shares of the biotechnology company's stock worth $92,363,000 after acquiring an additional 7,477,000 shares in the last quarter. State Street Corp grew its holdings in BioCryst Pharmaceuticals by 8.9% during the 2nd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 8,505,392 shares of the biotechnology company's stock worth $76,208,000 after acquiring an additional 691,988 shares in the last quarter. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership grew its holdings in BioCryst Pharmaceuticals by 22.1% during the 3rd quarter. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership now owns 5,225,986 shares of the biotechnology company's stock worth $39,665,000 after acquiring an additional 947,431 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Two Sigma Investments LP grew its holdings in BioCryst Pharmaceuticals by 3.1% during the 3rd quarter. Two Sigma Investments LP now owns 4,419,629 shares of the biotechnology company's stock worth $33,545,000 after acquiring an additional 131,406 shares in the last quarter. 85.88% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several research analysts have issued reports on BCRX shares. Evercore started coverage on shares of BioCryst Pharmaceuticals in a report on Wednesday, February 18th. They set an "outperform" rating and a $17.00 target price on the stock. Royal Bank Of Canada dropped their target price on shares of BioCryst Pharmaceuticals from $14.00 to $13.00 and set an "outperform" rating on the stock in a report on Friday, January 30th. Finally, Weiss Ratings upgraded shares of BioCryst Pharmaceuticals from a "sell (d-)" rating to a "hold (c)" rating in a report on Wednesday, March 4th. Ten analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and three have given a Hold rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has an average rating of "Moderate Buy" and a consensus target price of $19.64.

Insider Activity at BioCryst Pharmaceuticals

In other BioCryst Pharmaceuticals news, insider Alane P. Barnes sold 150,000 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Monday, March 16th. The shares were sold at an average price of $9.15, for a total transaction of $1,372,500.00. Following the completion of the sale, the insider directly owned 400,703 shares of the company's stock, valued at approximately $3,666,432.45. This represents a 27.24% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Insiders own 5.10% of the company's stock.

BioCryst Pharmaceuticals Stock Performance

BCRX stock opened at $9.19 on Monday. The firm has a market cap of $2.34 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 7.66 and a beta of 0.57. The firm has a 50-day simple moving average of $8.99 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $7.78. BioCryst Pharmaceuticals, Inc. has a one year low of $6.00 and a one year high of $11.31.

BioCryst Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ:BCRX - Get Free Report) last released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, February 26th. The biotechnology company reported $1.12 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.07 by $1.05. The business had revenue of $163.28 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $151.32 million. BioCryst Pharmaceuticals had a net margin of 30.16% and a negative return on equity of 84.33%. The company's quarterly revenue was up 209.1% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the prior year, the firm posted ($0.13) earnings per share. As a group, equities analysts predict that BioCryst Pharmaceuticals, Inc. will post 0.26 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

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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