Geron Co. (NASDAQ:GERN) Shares Sold by Rafferty Asset Management LLC

Rafferty Asset Management LLC lowered its holdings in Geron Co. (NASDAQ:GERN - Free Report) by 15.5% in the 4th quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 1,203,583 shares of the biopharmaceutical company's stock after selling 220,421 shares during the period. Rafferty Asset Management LLC owned approximately 0.20% of Geron worth $4,261,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other large investors also recently made changes to their positions in the company. Nvest Financial LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Geron in the fourth quarter worth $693,000. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. increased its position in shares of Geron by 1.7% in the fourth quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 4,523,864 shares of the biopharmaceutical company's stock worth $16,014,000 after acquiring an additional 73,482 shares in the last quarter. Barclays PLC boosted its stake in shares of Geron by 114.9% in the third quarter. Barclays PLC now owns 1,299,912 shares of the biopharmaceutical company's stock valued at $5,902,000 after purchasing an additional 694,931 shares during the period. Renaissance Technologies LLC purchased a new position in shares of Geron in the fourth quarter valued at $5,143,000. Finally, Ameriprise Financial Inc. boosted its stake in shares of Geron by 8.8% in the fourth quarter. Ameriprise Financial Inc. now owns 3,064,458 shares of the biopharmaceutical company's stock valued at $10,845,000 after purchasing an additional 247,018 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 73.71% of the company's stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several research analysts have recently weighed in on GERN shares. Barclays restated an "overweight" rating and issued a $4.00 target price (down from $9.00) on shares of Geron in a research note on Thursday, February 27th. Stifel Nicolaus decreased their target price on shares of Geron from $8.00 to $4.00 and set a "buy" rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, February 27th. B. Riley downgraded shares of Geron from a "buy" rating to a "neutral" rating and decreased their target price for the company from $3.50 to $2.00 in a research note on Thursday, February 27th. Scotiabank downgraded shares of Geron from a "sector outperform" rating to a "sector perform" rating and decreased their target price for the company from $4.00 to $1.50 in a research note on Thursday, May 8th. Finally, Needham & Company LLC restated a "buy" rating and issued a $5.00 target price on shares of Geron in a research note on Wednesday, March 12th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, three have assigned a hold rating, five have assigned a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has a consensus rating of "Moderate Buy" and an average target price of $5.06.

Geron Stock Down 2.0%

NASDAQ GERN traded down $0.03 during trading hours on Friday, reaching $1.45. 11,880,486 shares of the company traded hands, compared to its average volume of 11,776,645. Geron Co. has a 12 month low of $1.17 and a 12 month high of $5.34. The company has a current ratio of 2.89, a quick ratio of 2.74 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.04. The stock has a market capitalization of $923.53 million, a PE ratio of -4.53 and a beta of 0.76. The company has a 50 day moving average of $1.41 and a two-hundred day moving average of $2.53.

Geron (NASDAQ:GERN - Get Free Report) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, May 7th. The biopharmaceutical company reported ($0.03) EPS for the quarter, beating analysts' consensus estimates of ($0.04) by $0.01. The firm had revenue of $39.60 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $49.88 million. Geron had a negative net margin of 682.48% and a negative return on equity of 67.53%. The firm's revenue was up 12927.3% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the firm posted ($0.07) EPS. As a group, equities analysts expect that Geron Co. will post -0.25 earnings per share for the current 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.