CAMBRIDGE, Mass. (AP) _ Acceleron Pharma Inc. (XLRN) on Thursday reported a loss of $63.5 million in its first quarter.

On a per-share basis, the Cambridge, Massachusetts-based company said it had a loss of $1.05. Losses, adjusted for stock option expense and non-recurring costs, came to 77 cents per share.

The results topped Wall Street expectations. The average estimate of eight analysts surveyed by Zacks Investment Research was for a loss of 83 cents per share.

The clinical stage biotech developing protein therapeutics for cancer and rare diseases posted revenue of $24.8 million in the period, which did not meet Street forecasts. Six analysts surveyed by Zacks expected $27.4 million.

Acceleron shares have declined almost 5% since the beginning of the year. In the final minutes of trading on Thursday, shares hit $121.83, a climb of 20% in the last 12 months.

This story was generated by Automated Insights (http://automatedinsights.com/ap) using data from Zacks Investment Research. Access a Zacks stock report on XLRN at https://www.zacks.com/ap/XLRN

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