HighTower Advisors LLC Has $128,000 Stock Holdings in Geron Co. (NASDAQ:GERN)

HighTower Advisors LLC lifted its stake in Geron Co. (NASDAQ:GERN) by 33.1% in the fourth quarter, according to its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm owned 36,041 shares of the biopharmaceutical company’s stock after purchasing an additional 8,967 shares during the quarter. HighTower Advisors LLC’s holdings in Geron were worth $128,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also modified their holdings of the company. State Street Corp lifted its stake in Geron by 28.4% during the third quarter. State Street Corp now owns 28,961,671 shares of the biopharmaceutical company’s stock valued at $131,486,000 after buying an additional 6,413,204 shares in the last quarter. World Investment Advisors LLC raised its holdings in shares of Geron by 10,151.4% during the third quarter. World Investment Advisors LLC now owns 1,029,553 shares of the biopharmaceutical company’s stock valued at $4,674,000 after acquiring an additional 1,019,510 shares during the period. Exome Asset Management LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Geron in the 3rd quarter valued at approximately $4,109,000. Barclays PLC boosted its stake in Geron by 114.9% in the 3rd quarter. Barclays PLC now owns 1,299,912 shares of the biopharmaceutical company’s stock worth $5,902,000 after purchasing an additional 694,931 shares during the period. Finally, Wellington Management Group LLP raised its stake in Geron by 4.7% during the 3rd quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP now owns 12,662,404 shares of the biopharmaceutical company’s stock valued at $57,487,000 after purchasing an additional 570,580 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 73.71% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several brokerages have weighed in on GERN. Scotiabank dropped their target price on Geron from $6.00 to $4.00 and set a “sector outperform” rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, February 27th. Barclays reiterated an “overweight” rating and issued a $4.00 price objective (down from $9.00) on shares of Geron in a research note on Thursday, February 27th. Needham & Company LLC reiterated a “buy” rating and set a $5.00 target price on shares of Geron in a research note on Wednesday, March 12th. HC Wainwright reissued a “neutral” rating on shares of Geron in a report on Wednesday, March 12th. Finally, Stifel Nicolaus decreased their target price on shares of Geron from $8.00 to $4.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research 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. According to MarketBeat.com, the company presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $5.75.

Geron Stock Down 6.1 %

Shares of NASDAQ GERN opened at $1.38 on Friday. The stock’s fifty day moving average is $2.15 and its 200 day moving average is $3.28. The stock has a market capitalization of $878.93 million, a P/E ratio of -4.31 and a beta of 0.54. 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 Co. has a 52 week low of $1.33 and a 52 week high of $5.34.

Geron (NASDAQ:GERN) last released 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). The company had revenue of $47.54 million for 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%. Sell-side analysts forecast that Geron Co. 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.