SOUTH SAN FRANCISCO, Calif. (AP) _ Assembly Biosciences Inc. (ASMB) on Thursday reported a loss of $23.1 million in its first quarter.

The South San Francisco, California-based company said it had a loss of 48 cents per share.

The results topped Wall Street expectations. The average estimate of three analysts surveyed by Zacks Investment Research was for a loss of 49 cents per share.

In the final minutes of trading on Thursday, the company's shares hit $1.44. A year ago, they were trading at $4.

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

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