Geron Co. (NASDAQ:GERN) Short Interest Update

Geron Co. (NASDAQ:GERN) was the recipient of a significant decrease in short interest in March. As of March 15th, there was short interest totalling 45,630,000 shares, a decrease of 21.9% from the February 28th total of 58,410,000 shares. Approximately 7.8% of the company’s stock are short sold. Based on an average trading volume of 15,110,000 shares, the days-to-cover ratio is presently 3.0 days.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of analysts recently commented on GERN shares. Needham & Company LLC reiterated a “buy” rating and issued a $5.00 target price on shares of Geron in a research note on Wednesday, March 12th. Stifel Nicolaus cut their target price on Geron from $8.00 to $4.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, February 27th. B. Riley lowered Geron from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating and reduced their target price for the stock from $3.50 to $2.00 in a research note on Thursday, February 27th. Scotiabank dropped their price target on Geron from $6.00 to $4.00 and set a “sector outperform” rating on the stock in a research note on Thursday, February 27th. Finally, Barclays reissued an “overweight” rating and issued a $4.00 price objective (down from $9.00) on shares of Geron in a report on Thursday, February 27th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, three have given a hold rating, seven have assigned a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $5.75.

Institutional Trading of Geron

Hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. boosted its stake in shares of Geron by 2.6% during the 3rd quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 4,450,382 shares of the biopharmaceutical company’s stock worth $20,205,000 after acquiring an additional 111,361 shares in the last quarter. BNP Paribas Financial Markets raised its holdings in Geron by 519.0% in the 3rd quarter. BNP Paribas Financial Markets now owns 205,332 shares of the biopharmaceutical company’s stock worth $932,000 after purchasing an additional 172,160 shares during the period. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC boosted its position in Geron by 13.2% during the third quarter. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC now owns 1,020,743 shares of the biopharmaceutical company’s stock worth $4,634,000 after purchasing an additional 118,688 shares in the last quarter. Walleye Capital LLC acquired a new stake in Geron in the third quarter valued at approximately $7,521,000. Finally, Verition Fund Management LLC increased its position in shares of Geron by 256.6% in the third quarter. Verition Fund Management LLC now owns 47,455 shares of the biopharmaceutical company’s stock valued at $215,000 after buying an additional 34,146 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 73.71% of the company’s stock.

Geron Stock Performance

Shares of GERN stock traded down $0.05 on Tuesday, hitting $1.55. The company had a trading volume of 18,369,678 shares, compared to its average volume of 11,311,633. The firm has a market cap of $984.02 million, a P/E ratio of -4.83 and a beta of 0.54. Geron has a twelve month low of $1.46 and a twelve month high of $5.34. The company has a 50-day moving average price of $2.27 and a 200-day moving average price of $3.35. The company has a quick ratio of 2.74, a current ratio of 2.89 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.04.

Geron (NASDAQ:GERN) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, February 26th. The biopharmaceutical company reported ($0.04) earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, meeting analysts’ consensus estimates of ($0.04). The company had revenue of $47.54 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $45.29 million. Geron had a negative return on equity of 67.53% and a negative net margin of 682.48%. As a group, equities research analysts predict that Geron will post -0.25 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

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.