Invesco Ltd. Acquires 16,712 Shares of Merus (NASDAQ:MRUS)

Invesco Ltd. increased its stake in shares of Merus (NASDAQ:MRUS - Free Report) by 2.2% in the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The firm owned 786,365 shares of the biotechnology company's stock after purchasing an additional 16,712 shares during the quarter. Invesco Ltd. owned approximately 1.15% of Merus worth $33,067,000 as of its most recent filing with the SEC.

A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in MRUS. FMR LLC boosted its stake in shares of Merus by 0.4% during the 4th quarter. FMR LLC now owns 6,899,521 shares of the biotechnology company's stock valued at $290,125,000 after buying an additional 25,595 shares during the period. Springhill Fund Asset Management HK Co Ltd acquired a new stake in Merus during the fourth quarter valued at $3,524,000. Wells Fargo & Company MN boosted its position in Merus by 27.3% during the fourth quarter. Wells Fargo & Company MN now owns 1,400 shares of the biotechnology company's stock valued at $59,000 after purchasing an additional 300 shares during the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC grew its stake in Merus by 1.0% in the fourth quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 52,636 shares of the biotechnology company's stock valued at $2,213,000 after purchasing an additional 540 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Alliancebernstein L.P. increased its position in Merus by 9.1% in the 4th quarter. Alliancebernstein L.P. now owns 796,957 shares of the biotechnology company's stock worth $33,512,000 after purchasing an additional 66,326 shares during the last quarter. 96.14% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several brokerages recently commented on MRUS. Guggenheim reissued a "buy" rating and issued a $109.00 price target on shares of Merus in a research note on Friday, March 28th. Piper Sandler assumed coverage on shares of Merus in a research report on Thursday, February 13th. They issued an "overweight" rating and a $84.00 target price for the company. William Blair restated an "outperform" rating on shares of Merus in a research note on Friday, February 28th. Bank of America decreased their price objective on shares of Merus from $73.00 to $70.00 and set a "buy" rating for the company in a report on Monday, March 10th. Finally, Needham & Company LLC reissued a "buy" rating and set a $83.00 target price on shares of Merus in a research report on Wednesday, April 9th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, fourteen have assigned a buy rating and two have given a strong buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has an average rating of "Buy" and a consensus target price of $85.31.

Merus Stock Up 0.6 %

Shares of MRUS stock traded up $0.25 during trading hours on Wednesday, reaching $43.46. 451,439 shares of the company's stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 693,923. Merus has a fifty-two week low of $33.19 and a fifty-two week high of $61.61. The stock has a market capitalization of $3.00 billion, a P/E ratio of -11.00 and a beta of 1.02. The business has a fifty day moving average price of $43.94 and a 200-day moving average price of $44.92.

Merus (NASDAQ:MRUS - Get Free Report) last released its earnings results on Thursday, February 27th. The biotechnology company reported ($0.41) EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of ($0.89) by $0.48. The firm had revenue of $9.14 million during the quarter, compared to analysts' expectations of $10.57 million. Merus had a negative net margin of 680.61% and a negative return on equity of 38.89%. As a group, research analysts expect that Merus will post -3.85 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Merus Company Profile

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.