Orbimed Advisors LLC Raises Stock Holdings in Geron Co. (NASDAQ:GERN)

Orbimed Advisors LLC grew its position in shares of Geron Co. (NASDAQ:GERN - Free Report) by 442.0% in the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 2,168,000 shares of the biopharmaceutical company's stock after acquiring an additional 1,768,000 shares during the quarter. Orbimed Advisors LLC owned about 0.36% of Geron worth $7,675,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission.

Several other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently modified their holdings of the company. Millennium Management LLC grew its holdings in Geron by 70.7% during the fourth quarter. Millennium Management LLC now owns 7,034,632 shares of the biopharmaceutical company's stock worth $24,903,000 after buying an additional 2,914,427 shares in the last quarter. MIRAE ASSET GLOBAL ETFS HOLDINGS Ltd. lifted its position in shares of Geron by 3.1% during the 4th quarter. MIRAE ASSET GLOBAL ETFS HOLDINGS Ltd. now owns 384,411 shares of the biopharmaceutical company's stock valued at $1,354,000 after buying an additional 11,652 shares during the last quarter. Lazard Asset Management LLC purchased a new position in shares of Geron during the 4th quarter valued at $89,000. J. Goldman & Co LP lifted its holdings in Geron by 847.4% during the 4th quarter. J. Goldman & Co LP now owns 1,669,684 shares of the biopharmaceutical company's stock worth $5,911,000 after purchasing an additional 1,493,445 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Janus Henderson Group PLC lifted its holdings in Geron by 20.0% during the 4th quarter. Janus Henderson Group PLC now owns 27,082,461 shares of the biopharmaceutical company's stock worth $95,769,000 after purchasing an additional 4,516,615 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors own 73.71% of the company's stock.

Geron Stock Up 5.0%

Geron stock traded up $0.06 during mid-day trading on Friday, hitting $1.27. The company had a trading volume of 13,831,903 shares, compared to its average volume of 11,635,886. 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's 50 day moving average price is $1.44 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $2.62. Geron Co. has a 12 month low of $1.17 and a 12 month high of $5.34. The company has a market capitalization of $808.89 million, a PE ratio of -3.97 and a beta of 0.76.

Geron (NASDAQ:GERN - Get Free Report) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, May 7th. The biopharmaceutical company reported ($0.03) earnings per share (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 return on equity of 67.53% and a negative net margin of 682.48%. The company's quarterly revenue was up 12927.3% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the prior year, the company posted ($0.07) earnings per share. As a group, sell-side analysts anticipate that Geron Co. will post -0.25 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Analyst Ratings Changes

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

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.