Merus (NASDAQ:MRUS) Lowered to “Hold” Rating by Leerink Partnrs

Leerink Partnrs lowered shares of Merus (NASDAQ:MRUS) from a strong-buy rating to a hold rating in a report issued on Sunday,Zacks.com reports.

MRUS has been the topic of several other reports. Lifesci Capital reissued a “market perform” rating and issued a $97.00 target price on shares of Merus in a research report on Tuesday, September 30th. Leerink Partners reissued a “market perform” rating and issued a $97.00 target price (up from $95.00) on shares of Merus in a research report on Monday. William Blair cut shares of Merus from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Monday, September 29th. Canaccord Genuity Group lowered shares of Merus from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating and raised their price target for the company from $67.00 to $97.00 in a report on Monday, September 29th. Finally, UBS Group lowered shares of Merus from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating and raised their price target for the company from $72.00 to $97.00 in a report on Tuesday, September 30th. Four equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, fourteen have assigned a Hold rating and one has given a Sell rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $93.12.

Merus Price Performance

Merus stock opened at $94.27 on Friday. Merus has a 12-month low of $33.19 and a 12-month high of $94.56. The stock has a market capitalization of $7.13 billion, a P/E ratio of -17.14 and a beta of 1.26. The firm’s 50-day moving average is $70.07 and its two-hundred day moving average is $56.48.

Merus (NASDAQ:MRUS) last released its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, August 5th. The biotechnology company reported ($2.23) earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of ($1.17) by ($1.06). Merus had a negative return on equity of 50.28% and a negative net margin of 685.64%.The firm had revenue of $8.83 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $9.77 million. As a group, analysts forecast that Merus will post -3.85 EPS for the current year.

Insider Activity

In other news, COO Peter B. Silverman sold 25,000 shares of Merus stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, July 17th. The shares were sold at an average price of $60.00, for a total transaction of $1,500,000.00. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through this link. Insiders have sold a total of 48,500 shares of company stock worth $2,792,500 in the last 90 days. Company insiders own 3.70% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Trading of Merus

A number of hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in MRUS. GAMMA Investing LLC raised its stake in shares of Merus by 2,153.6% during the first quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 631 shares of the biotechnology company’s stock valued at $27,000 after purchasing an additional 603 shares during the period. Harbor Capital Advisors Inc. increased its stake in shares of Merus by 49.0% in the first quarter. Harbor Capital Advisors Inc. now owns 64,374 shares of the biotechnology company’s stock worth $2,710,000 after buying an additional 21,166 shares during the last quarter. Avanza Fonder AB bought a new stake in shares of Merus in the first quarter worth $118,000. Net Worth Advisory Group bought a new stake in shares of Merus in the first quarter worth $213,000. Finally, Moody Aldrich Partners LLC increased its stake in shares of Merus by 273.4% in the first quarter. Moody Aldrich Partners LLC now owns 108,281 shares of the biotechnology company’s stock worth $4,558,000 after buying an additional 79,286 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 96.14% of the company’s stock.

About Merus

Merus N.V., a clinical-stage immuno-oncology company, engages in the development of antibody therapeutics in the Netherlands. Its bispecific antibody candidate pipeline includes Zenocutuzumab (MCLA-128), which is in a phase 2 clinical trials for the treatment of patients with metastatic breast cancer and castration-resistant prostate cancer, as well as in Phase 1/2 clinical trials for the treatment of solid tumors that harbor Neuregulin 1.