Prothena (NASDAQ:PRTA) Cut to “Hold” at Wall Street Zen

Wall Street Zen lowered shares of Prothena (NASDAQ:PRTA) from a buy rating to a hold rating in a research note issued to investors on Saturday.

PRTA has been the topic of a number of other reports. HC Wainwright reiterated a “buy” rating and set a $30.00 target price on shares of Prothena in a research report on Friday. Citigroup restated an “outperform” rating on shares of Prothena in a research report on Friday, May 8th. Weiss Ratings lowered shares of Prothena from a “sell (d-)” rating to a “sell (e+)” rating in a research report on Thursday, July 9th. UBS Group reissued a “buy” rating on shares of Prothena in a research note on Friday. Finally, Citizens Jmp raised their target price on shares of Prothena from $19.00 to $20.00 and gave the company a “market outperform” rating in a report on Friday, May 8th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, five have assigned a Buy rating, one has given a Hold rating and one has assigned a Sell rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $23.75.

Prothena Trading Down 0.6%

Shares of Prothena stock opened at $8.70 on Friday. The company has a 50-day moving average of $9.13 and a two-hundred day moving average of $9.45. Prothena has a 12-month low of $6.61 and a 12-month high of $11.80. The stock has a market cap of $455.44 million, a PE ratio of -3.09, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.40 and a beta of -0.31.

Prothena (NASDAQ:PRTA) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, May 7th. The biotechnology company reported $0.60 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of ($0.31) by $0.91. Prothena had a negative return on equity of 43.44% and a negative net margin of 260.92%.The business had revenue of $51.08 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $0.81 million. On average, sell-side analysts forecast that Prothena will post 0.18 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insider Activity

In other Prothena news, major shareholder William P. Scully acquired 20,000 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, June 16th. The stock was acquired at an average price of $7.90 per share, with a total value of $158,000.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider directly owned 756,000 shares in the company, valued at approximately $5,972,400. This trade represents a 2.72% increase in their ownership of the stock. The purchase was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. Insiders acquired a total of 345,000 shares of company stock worth $3,097,250 in the last 90 days. 10.40% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Prothena

Several large investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the business. Tower Research Capital LLC TRC boosted its stake in Prothena by 571.0% in the 2nd quarter. Tower Research Capital LLC TRC now owns 12,709 shares of the biotechnology company’s stock worth $77,000 after buying an additional 10,815 shares during the last quarter. ProShare Advisors LLC acquired a new position in shares of Prothena during the 4th quarter valued at about $100,000. PDT Partners LLC purchased a new position in shares of Prothena during the 4th quarter worth about $108,000. Voleon Capital Management LP purchased a new position in shares of Prothena during the 2nd quarter worth about $113,000. Finally, DRW Securities LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Prothena in the fourth quarter worth approximately $114,000. 97.08% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

About Prothena

Prothena Corporation plc is a clinical-stage biotechnology company dedicated to the discovery and development of novel therapies for neurodegenerative and rare diseases driven by misfolded proteins. The company’s research focuses on immunotherapies and small molecules designed to target and clear disease-causing protein aggregates. Prothena leverages proprietary protein engineering and antibody discovery platforms to advance candidates through preclinical and clinical stages.

The company’s most advanced program is an antibody targeting aggregated alpha-synuclein for the potential treatment of Parkinson’s disease, currently in mid-stage clinical trials.