BioCryst Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ:BCRX) Shares Up 13.8% – Should You Buy?

BioCryst Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (NASDAQ:BCRX) shares shot up 13.8% during trading on Monday . The company traded as high as $8.30 and last traded at $9.3520. 348,511 shares traded hands during trading, a decline of 93% from the average session volume of 4,679,633 shares. The stock had previously closed at $8.22.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

BCRX has been the subject of several recent research reports. HC Wainwright upped their price target on shares of BioCryst Pharmaceuticals from $30.00 to $32.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Monday, December 15th. Royal Bank Of Canada dropped their price target on shares of BioCryst Pharmaceuticals from $14.00 to $13.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday, January 30th. Weiss Ratings raised BioCryst Pharmaceuticals from a “sell (d-)” rating to a “hold (c)” rating in a report on Wednesday, March 4th. Finally, Evercore started coverage on BioCryst Pharmaceuticals in a report on Wednesday, February 18th. They issued an “outperform” rating and a $17.00 price objective for the company. Ten analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and three have issued a Hold rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $19.64.

BioCryst Pharmaceuticals Trading Up 10.3%

The business’s 50-day simple moving average is $7.31 and its 200 day simple moving average is $7.39. The company has a market capitalization of $2.27 billion, a P/E ratio of 7.57 and a beta of 0.73.

BioCryst Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ:BCRX) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, February 26th. The biotechnology company reported $1.12 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.07 by $1.05. BioCryst Pharmaceuticals had a net margin of 30.16% and a negative return on equity of 84.33%. The business had revenue of $163.28 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $151.32 million. During the same period last year, the firm posted ($0.13) earnings per share. The business’s revenue was up 209.1% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, sell-side analysts predict that BioCryst Pharmaceuticals, Inc. will post -0.36 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insider Activity at BioCryst Pharmaceuticals

In other BioCryst Pharmaceuticals news, insider Alane P. Barnes sold 21,773 shares of BioCryst Pharmaceuticals stock in a transaction dated Monday, December 22nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $7.65, for a total transaction of $166,563.45. Following the transaction, the insider owned 398,751 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $3,050,445.15. The trade was a 5.18% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. 5.10% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On BioCryst Pharmaceuticals

Hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. Vanguard Group Inc. grew its holdings in shares of BioCryst Pharmaceuticals by 2.2% during the 4th quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 22,273,375 shares of the biotechnology company’s stock valued at $173,732,000 after acquiring an additional 482,494 shares in the last quarter. RA Capital Management L.P. acquired a new stake in BioCryst Pharmaceuticals during the fourth quarter valued at $123,452,000. Deerfield Management Company L.P. grew its stake in BioCryst Pharmaceuticals by 159.4% in the third quarter. Deerfield Management Company L.P. now owns 12,169,000 shares of the biotechnology company’s stock valued at $92,363,000 after purchasing an additional 7,477,000 shares in the last quarter. State Street Corp grew its stake in shares of BioCryst Pharmaceuticals by 12.9% in the 4th quarter. State Street Corp now owns 11,073,211 shares of the biotechnology company’s stock valued at $86,371,000 after buying an additional 1,265,773 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Janus Henderson Group PLC lifted its stake in BioCryst Pharmaceuticals by 7,807.2% in the fourth quarter. Janus Henderson Group PLC now owns 7,404,386 shares of the biotechnology company’s stock valued at $57,791,000 after acquiring an additional 7,310,745 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 85.88% of the company’s stock.

BioCryst Pharmaceuticals Company Profile

BioCryst Pharmaceuticals, Inc is a clinical‐stage biotechnology company headquartered in Durham, North Carolina, that focuses on the discovery and development of novel, oral small‐molecule medicines for rare and serious diseases. Since its founding in 1986, the company has leveraged structure‐based drug design to advance a pipeline of targeted therapeutics designed to address underlying disease mechanisms rather than just treat symptoms.

The company’s first commercial product, Orladeyo (berotralstat), is an oral kallikrein inhibitor approved for the prophylactic treatment of hereditary angioedema (HAE) in both the United States and Europe.