Wellington Management Group LLP Sells 10,525,815 Shares of Geron Corporation $GERN

Key Points

• Wellington Management Group LLP significantly reduced its stake in Geron Corporation by 77.9% in Q1, holding 2,984,299 shares after selling 10,525,815 shares.
• Geron's stock is currently trading at $1.40, down 2.1%, with a market capitalization of approximately $893.23 million.
• Analysts have mixed ratings for Geron, with a consensus of "Moderate Buy" and a price target of $4.19, despite some downgrades indicating a selling sentiment.

Wellington Management Group LLP reduced its holdings in Geron Corporation (NASDAQ:GERN - Free Report) by 77.9% in the first quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 2,984,299 shares of the biopharmaceutical company's stock after selling 10,525,815 shares during the quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP owned about 0.47% of Geron worth $4,745,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other institutional investors have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in GERN. Vestal Point Capital LP grew its position in shares of Geron by 947.6% during the 4th quarter. Vestal Point Capital LP now owns 11,000,000 shares of the biopharmaceutical company's stock worth $38,940,000 after buying an additional 9,950,000 shares during the period. Braidwell LP bought a new position in Geron during the fourth quarter worth $24,802,000. Boxer Capital Management LLC acquired a new stake in Geron in the fourth quarter worth $21,240,000. Woodline Partners LP increased its stake in Geron by 64.6% in the fourth quarter. Woodline Partners LP now owns 11,587,344 shares of the biopharmaceutical company's stock valued at $41,019,000 after purchasing an additional 4,549,031 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Janus Henderson Group PLC raised its holdings in shares of Geron by 20.0% during the fourth quarter. Janus Henderson Group PLC now owns 27,082,461 shares of the biopharmaceutical company's stock valued at $95,769,000 after purchasing an additional 4,516,615 shares during the period. 73.71% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Geron Stock Down 1.4%

Shares of NASDAQ:GERN traded down $0.02 during mid-day trading on Thursday, hitting $1.38. 5,222,808 shares of the company traded hands, compared to its average volume of 8,308,847. The stock has a 50-day moving average price of $1.34 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $1.48. Geron Corporation has a 12-month low of $1.09 and a 12-month high of $4.83. The stock has a market cap of $880.47 million, a P/E ratio of -10.62 and a beta of 0.63. The company has a current ratio of 7.87, a quick ratio of 6.79 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.46.

Geron (NASDAQ:GERN - Get Free Report) last released its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, August 6th. The biopharmaceutical company reported ($0.02) EPS for the quarter, beating analysts' consensus estimates of ($0.03) by $0.01. The business 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%.Geron's quarterly revenue was up 5455.6% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the firm posted ($0.10) EPS. On average, equities research analysts forecast that Geron Corporation will post -0.25 earnings per share for the current year.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of brokerages recently commented on GERN. Scotiabank lowered 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 report on Thursday, May 8th. The Goldman Sachs Group started coverage on Geron in a research note on Thursday, July 10th. They issued a "sell" rating and a $1.00 price objective for the company. One research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, four have assigned a Buy rating, three have given a Hold rating and one has given a Sell rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company presently has a consensus rating of "Moderate Buy" and a consensus target price of $4.19.

Geron Company 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.