Pliant Therapeutics (NASDAQ:PLRX) Announces Quarterly Earnings Results, Beats Expectations By $0.17 EPS

Pliant Therapeutics (NASDAQ:PLRX) posted its quarterly earnings data on Monday. The company reported ($0.82) earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of ($0.99) by $0.17, Zacks reports.

Pliant Therapeutics Stock Performance

Shares of NASDAQ PLRX opened at $1.38 on Tuesday. Pliant Therapeutics has a 12 month low of $1.37 and a 12 month high of $16.81. The company has a market cap of $83.98 million, a P/E ratio of -0.41 and a beta of 1.03. The business’s 50 day moving average is $9.08 and its two-hundred day moving average is $11.81. The company has a quick ratio of 10.26, a current ratio of 10.26 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.09.

Insider Activity

In related news, General Counsel Mike Ouimette sold 10,230 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, January 22nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $10.99, for a total value of $112,427.70. Following the completion of the transaction, the general counsel now directly owns 70,544 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $775,278.56. This trade represents a 12.66 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, CEO Bernard Coulie sold 52,419 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Friday, January 17th. The shares were sold at an average price of $11.20, for a total transaction of $587,092.80. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 430,517 shares in the company, valued at $4,821,790.40. This trade represents a 10.85 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last three months, insiders sold 91,855 shares of company stock valued at $1,026,628. 6.40% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of equities analysts recently issued reports on PLRX shares. HC Wainwright lowered Pliant Therapeutics from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating in a research report on Monday, February 10th. Wells Fargo & Company downgraded Pliant Therapeutics from an “overweight” rating to an “equal weight” rating and cut their price objective for the stock from $41.00 to $4.00 in a report on Monday, February 10th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. downgraded shares of Pliant Therapeutics from an “overweight” rating to a “neutral” rating in a research report on Monday, February 10th. Royal Bank of Canada downgraded shares of Pliant Therapeutics from an “outperform” rating to a “sector perform” rating and cut their target price for the company from $45.00 to $4.00 in a research note on Monday, February 10th. Finally, Leerink Partners lowered Pliant Therapeutics from an “outperform” rating to a “market perform” rating and dropped their price target for the company from $33.00 to $2.00 in a research report on Monday. Nine analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, two have issued a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the company has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $13.88.

Pliant Therapeutics Company Profile

Pliant Therapeutics, Inc, a clinical stage biopharmaceutical company, discovers, develops, and commercializes novel therapies for the treatment of fibrosis and related diseases in the United States. The company's lead candidate is bexotegrast, an oral, small-molecule, dual selective inhibitor of avß6 and avß1 integrins, which is in phase 2b trials for idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis and in phase 2a trial for primary sclerosing cholangitis.