Today is shaping up negative for Viridian Therapeutics, Inc. (NASDAQ:VRDN) shareholders, with the analysts delivering a substantial negative revision to this year's forecasts. This report focused on revenue estimates, and it looks as though the consensus view of the business has become substantially more conservative. Investors however, have been notably more optimistic about Viridian Therapeutics recently, with the stock price up an impressive 10% to US$22.97 in the past week. With such a sharp increase, it seems brokers may have seen something that is not yet being priced in by the wider market.

Following the latest downgrade, the current consensus, from the 14 analysts covering Viridian Therapeutics, is for revenues of US$22m in 2026, which would reflect a sizeable 70% reduction in Viridian Therapeutics' sales over the past 12 months. Per-share losses are expected to explode, reaching US$3.97 per share. Yet before this consensus update, the analysts had been forecasting revenues of US$28m and losses of US$3.85 per share in 2026. Ergo, there's been a clear change in sentiment, with the analysts administering a notable cut to this year's revenue estimates, while at the same time increasing their loss per share forecasts.

There was no major change to the consensus price target of US$36.63, signalling that the business is performing roughly in line with expectations, despite lower earnings per share forecasts.

These estimates are interesting, but it can be useful to paint some more broad strokes when seeing how forecasts compare, both to the Viridian Therapeutics' past performance and to peers in the same industry. These estimates imply that sales are expected to slow, with a forecast annualised revenue decline of 91% by the end of 2026. This indicates a significant reduction from annual growth of 83% over the last five years. Compare this with our data, which suggests that other companies in the same industry are, in aggregate, expected to see their revenue grow 23% per year. It's pretty clear that Viridian Therapeutics' revenues are expected to perform substantially worse than the wider industry.

The Bottom Line

The most important thing to take away is that analysts increased their loss per share estimates for this year. Regrettably, they also downgraded their revenue estimates, and the latest forecasts imply the business will grow sales slower than the wider market. Overall, given the drastic downgrade to this year's forecasts, we'd be feeling a little more wary of Viridian Therapeutics going forwards.

Even so, the longer term trajectory of the business is much more important for the value creation of shareholders. We have estimates - from multiple Viridian Therapeutics analysts - going out to 2028, and you can see them free on our platform here.

Of course, seeing company management invest large sums of money in a stock can be just as useful as knowing whether analysts are downgrading their estimates. So you may also wish to search this free list of stocks with high insider ownership.

This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. We provide commentary based on historical data and analyst forecasts only using an unbiased methodology and our articles are not intended to be financial advice. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. We aim to bring you long-term focused analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Simply Wall St has no position in any stocks mentioned.