B. Riley Downgrades Geron (NASDAQ:GERN) to Neutral

Geron (NASDAQ:GERN) was downgraded by investment analysts at B. Riley from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating in a research report issued on Thursday, MarketBeat Ratings reports. They presently have a $2.00 price objective on the biopharmaceutical company’s stock, down from their prior price objective of $3.50. B. Riley’s price objective suggests a potential upside of 13.64% from the company’s current price. B. Riley also issued estimates for Geron’s Q1 2025 earnings at ($0.03) EPS, Q2 2025 earnings at ($0.03) EPS, Q3 2025 earnings at ($0.03) EPS and Q4 2025 earnings at ($0.02) EPS.

Several other brokerages also recently weighed in on GERN. HC Wainwright downgraded Geron from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating in a research report on Wednesday. Barclays reiterated an “overweight” rating and issued a $4.00 price objective (down previously from $9.00) on shares of Geron in a research report on Thursday. Finally, Needham & Company LLC upped their target price on Geron from $6.00 to $7.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Monday, January 13th. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, three have issued a hold rating, eight have issued a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, Geron has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $5.68.

Geron Stock Performance

Shares of GERN stock opened at $1.76 on Thursday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.04, a quick ratio of 2.74 and a current ratio of 2.89. Geron has a fifty-two week low of $1.46 and a fifty-two week high of $5.34. The stock has a 50 day moving average price of $2.97 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $3.80. The company has a market capitalization of $1.06 billion, a P/E ratio of -5.50 and a beta of 0.53.

Geron (NASDAQ:GERN) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, February 26th. The biopharmaceutical company reported ($0.04) earnings per share for the quarter, meeting the consensus estimate of ($0.04). Geron had a negative return on equity of 67.53% and a negative net margin of 682.48%. The firm had revenue of $47.54 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $45.29 million. Analysts expect that Geron will post -0.25 earnings per share for the current year.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Geron

Several hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in GERN. RTW Investments LP purchased a new stake in Geron in the third quarter worth $200,268,000. Holocene Advisors LP purchased a new stake in Geron in the third quarter worth $82,498,000. Janus Henderson Group PLC grew its stake in Geron by 140.0% in the third quarter. Janus Henderson Group PLC now owns 22,565,846 shares of the biopharmaceutical company’s stock worth $102,193,000 after purchasing an additional 13,163,889 shares during the period. Vestal Point Capital LP grew its stake in Geron by 947.6% in the fourth quarter. Vestal Point Capital LP now owns 11,000,000 shares of the biopharmaceutical company’s stock worth $38,940,000 after purchasing an additional 9,950,000 shares during the period. Finally, Braidwell LP purchased a new stake in Geron in the fourth quarter worth $24,802,000. 73.71% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

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.