HC Wainwright Reaffirms Neutral Rating for DURECT (NASDAQ:DRRX)

DURECT (NASDAQ:DRRX)‘s stock had its “neutral” rating reaffirmed by analysts at HC Wainwright in a research report issued on Thursday,Benzinga reports.

Separately, StockNews.com assumed coverage on DURECT in a research report on Monday, November 11th. They issued a “sell” rating for the company.

DURECT Trading Down 9.8 %

Shares of NASDAQ:DRRX opened at $1.01 on Thursday. The firm has a market cap of $31.35 million, a PE ratio of -1.66 and a beta of 1.13. The company has a fifty day simple moving average of $1.35 and a 200 day simple moving average of $1.37. DURECT has a 12-month low of $0.48 and a 12-month high of $1.88.

DURECT (NASDAQ:DRRX) last released its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, August 13th. The specialty pharmaceutical company reported ($0.12) earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of ($0.17) by $0.05. DURECT had a negative return on equity of 235.22% and a negative net margin of 198.58%. The business had revenue of $2.17 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $2.49 million. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm posted ($0.46) EPS. As a group, equities research analysts forecast that DURECT will post -0.78 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On DURECT

Several hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in the stock. International Assets Investment Management LLC raised its stake in shares of DURECT by 41.3% in the 2nd quarter. International Assets Investment Management LLC now owns 21,550 shares of the specialty pharmaceutical company’s stock valued at $28,000 after buying an additional 6,300 shares in the last quarter. Gagnon Securities LLC increased its stake in DURECT by 6.0% in the first quarter. Gagnon Securities LLC now owns 380,131 shares of the specialty pharmaceutical company’s stock valued at $460,000 after acquiring an additional 21,425 shares during the period. Tocqueville Asset Management L.P. lifted its stake in DURECT by 10.8% during the first quarter. Tocqueville Asset Management L.P. now owns 256,220 shares of the specialty pharmaceutical company’s stock worth $310,000 after purchasing an additional 25,000 shares during the period. Accredited Investors Inc. acquired a new stake in DURECT during the second quarter valued at approximately $113,000. Finally, Richmond Brothers Inc. grew its stake in shares of DURECT by 39.5% in the 2nd quarter. Richmond Brothers Inc. now owns 1,072,014 shares of the specialty pharmaceutical company’s stock valued at $1,383,000 after purchasing an additional 303,670 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 28.03% of the company’s stock.

About DURECT

DURECT Corporation, a biopharmaceutical company, develops medicines based on its epigenetic regulator program. The company's lead product larsucosterol (DUR-928), an endogenous, orally bioavailable small molecule that is in Phase IIb clinical trial to play a regulatory role in lipid metabolism, stress and inflammatory responses, and cell death and survival to treat alcohol-associated hepatitis, as well as completed Phase Ib clinical trial to treat patients with nonalcoholic steatohepatitis.