HC Wainwright Cuts Prothena (NASDAQ:PRTA) Price Target to $84.00

Prothena (NASDAQ:PRTA) had its price target cut by stock analysts at HC Wainwright from $90.00 to $84.00 in a report released on Thursday, Benzinga reports. The brokerage currently has a “buy” rating on the biotechnology company’s stock. HC Wainwright’s target price suggests a potential upside of 281.82% from the stock’s current price.

Other equities analysts also recently issued research reports about the stock. JMP Securities lifted their target price on shares of Prothena from $81.00 to $85.00 and gave the stock a “market outperform” rating in a research note on Friday, February 16th. Royal Bank of Canada lowered their price objective on shares of Prothena from $36.00 to $35.00 and set a “sector perform” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday, February 16th. Bank of America restated a “neutral” rating and issued a $38.00 price objective (down from $68.00) on shares of Prothena in a report on Tuesday, January 30th. StockNews.com lowered Prothena from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a research report on Monday, February 19th. Finally, Cantor Fitzgerald reiterated an “overweight” rating on shares of Prothena in a research report on Wednesday, April 10th. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, two have issued a hold rating and five have assigned a buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $67.00.

Prothena Stock Performance

PRTA traded down $1.03 during mid-day trading on Thursday, reaching $22.00. 634,713 shares of the stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 733,586. The stock has a market capitalization of $1.18 billion, a PE ratio of -7.80 and a beta of 0.30. Prothena has a 1 year low of $19.65 and a 1 year high of $77.36. The company has a 50 day moving average price of $24.30 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $30.50.

Prothena (NASDAQ:PRTA) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, May 8th. The biotechnology company reported ($1.34) EPS for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of ($1.21) by ($0.13). Prothena had a negative return on equity of 24.84% and a negative net margin of 160.91%. The business had revenue of $0.05 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $3.75 million. During the same quarter last year, the business posted ($0.89) earnings per share. Sell-side analysts expect that Prothena will post -4.88 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Institutional Trading of Prothena

Several institutional investors and hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of the stock. FMR LLC grew its holdings in Prothena by 1.5% in the third quarter. FMR LLC now owns 8,030,290 shares of the biotechnology company’s stock worth $387,461,000 after purchasing an additional 117,524 shares during the period. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD grew its stake in shares of Prothena by 10.9% in the fourth quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 4,237,351 shares of the biotechnology company’s stock worth $153,986,000 after acquiring an additional 417,338 shares during the last quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP increased its stake in Prothena by 21.1% during the 4th quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP now owns 2,594,102 shares of the biotechnology company’s stock valued at $94,270,000 after purchasing an additional 452,455 shares in the last quarter. Boxer Capital LLC raised its holdings in Prothena by 6.4% in the fourth quarter. Boxer Capital LLC now owns 665,000 shares of the biotechnology company’s stock worth $24,166,000 after buying an additional 40,000 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Granahan Investment Management LLC increased its position in shares of Prothena by 19.9% during the fourth quarter. Granahan Investment Management LLC now owns 417,157 shares of the biotechnology company’s stock valued at $15,159,000 after acquiring an additional 69,092 shares in the last quarter. 97.08% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

About Prothena

Prothena Corporation plc, a late-stage clinical biotechnology company, focuses on discovery and development of novel therapies to treat diseases caused by protein dysregulation in the United States. The company is involved in developing birtamimab, an investigational humanized antibody that is in Phase III clinical trial for the treatment of AL amyloidosis; Prasinezumab, a humanized monoclonal antibody, for the treatment of Parkinson's disease and other related synucleinopathies which is in Phase IIb clinical trial; NNC6019 that is in Phase lI clinical trial for the treatment of ATTR amyloidosis; and BMS-986446 and PRX012, which is in Phase I clinical trial for the treatment of Alzheimer's disease.