Geron  had a rough go of it over the last two years, as shares have lost over 70% of their value. The company controversially sold off its stem-cell business to focus on hot cancer drug candidate imetelstat. If imetelstat were a success, management would look brilliant for backing the right horse while avoiding the stem cell R&D black hole. Unfortunately, that proved to be a big if. Imetelstat’s Phase 2 trial for breast cancer was cancelled, and Geron decided not to advance it to Phase 3 in NSCLC.

As Geron presses ahead with imetelstat, it is losing support from Wall Street. A Stifel Nicolaus analyst ripped the company’s plans apart, calling them “flawed and sluggish,” while dropping its rating all the way to sell.

Watch and find out what Motley Fool health-care analyst David Williamson thinks about Geron’s downgrade, and what it means for investors. 

What macro trend was Warren Buffett referring to when he said, “This is the tapeworm that’s eating at American competitiveness?” Find out in our free report, What’s Really Eating at America’s Competitiveness. You’ll also discover an idea to profit as companies work to eradicate this efficiency-sucking tapeworm. Just click here for free, immediate access.

The article Wall Street Is Out of Patience With This Biotech originally appeared on Fool.com.

David Williamson has no position in any stocks mentioned. Follow David on Twitter @MotleyDavid. 
The Motley Fool has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. Try any of our Foolish newsletter services free for 30 days. We Fools may not all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.

Copyright © 1995 – 2013 The Motley Fool, LLC. All rights reserved. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.

(function(c,a){window.mixpanel=a;var b,d,h,e;b=c.createElement(“script”);
b.type=”text/javascript”;b.async=!0;b.src=(“https:”===c.location.protocol?”https:”:”http:”)+
‘//cdn.mxpnl.com/libs/mixpanel-2.2.min.js’;d=c.getElementsByTagName(“script”)[0];
d.parentNode.insertBefore(b,d);a._i=[];a.init=function(b,c,f){function d(a,b){
var c=b.split(“.”);2==c.length&&(a=a[c[0]],b=c[1]);a[b]=function(){a.push([b].concat(
Array.prototype.slice.call(arguments,0)))}}var g=a;”undefined”!==typeof f?g=a[f]=[]:
f=”mixpanel”;g.people=g.people||[];h=[‘disable’,’track’,’track_pageview’,’track_links’,
‘track_forms’,’register’,’register_once’,’unregister’,’identify’,’alias’,’name_tag’,
‘set_config’,’people.set’,’people.increment’];for(e=0;e<h.length;e++)d(g,h[e]);
a._i.push([b,c,f])};a.__SV=1.2;})(document,window.mixpanel||[]);
mixpanel.init("9659875b92ba8fa639ba476aedbb73b9");

function addEvent(obj, evType, fn, useCapture){
if (obj.addEventListener){
obj.addEventListener(evType, fn, useCapture);
return true;
} else if (obj.attachEvent){
var r = obj.attachEvent("on"+evType, fn);
return r;
}
}

addEvent(window, "load", function(){new FoolVisualSciences();})
addEvent(window, "load", function(){new PickAd();})

var themeName = 'dailyfinance.com';
var _gaq = _gaq || [];
_gaq.push(['_setAccount', 'UA-24928199-1']);
_gaq.push(['_trackPageview']);

(function () {

var ga …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at DailyFinance