SOUTH SAN FRANCISCO, Calif. (AP) — SOUTH SAN FRANCISCO, Calif. (AP) — Alector Inc. (ALEC) on Wednesday reported a second-quarter loss of $38.7 million, after reporting a profit in the same period a year earlier.

On a per-share basis, the South San Francisco, California-based company said it had a loss of 40 cents.

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

The biotechnology company posted revenue of $15.1 million in the period, which fell short of Street forecasts. Four analysts surveyed by Zacks expected $16 million.

In the final minutes of trading on Wednesday, the company's shares hit $4.91. A year ago, they were trading at $7.36.

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