Friday's After-Hours Movers Led By Vital Therapies, Pioneer Energy, SpartanNash & RCS Capital

Shares of Vital Therapies Inc VTL surged 10.02 percent during Friday trading. However, the stock is down more than 72 percent since the bell rang, after the company announced that topline results from VTI-208, its phase 3 randomized, controlled, open-label trial, assessing the ELAD System in subjects with alcohol-induced liver decompensation (AILD) could not meet the primary endpoint of overall survival through at least 91 days, evaluated using the Kaplan Meier statistical method.

A press release explains that, “A hazard ratio of 1.027 (slightly favoring the control group) with a log rank p-value of 0.90 (not statistically significant, N.S.) indicated that there was no difference between treated and control subjects in the primary endpoint.”

Opposite to Vital Therapeutics, which is the biggest loser of the afternoon, Pioneer Energy Services Corp PES is the largest gainer, up roughly 13.5 percent in after-hours trading, recuperating the ground lost during the day (the stock fell 11.82 percent), which followed a downgrade in the company’s Moody's Liquidity Stress Index (LSI).

Also on the rise is SpartanNash Co SPTNa small-cap multi-regional grocery distributor and grocery retailer which saw its stock surge 7.6 percent since the bell rang on Friday, after it fell 7.09 percent during the regular trading session. While the fall was driven by the company’s Thursday earnings call, the after-hours rally seems not to be responding to any particular news.

Finally, shares of micro-cap RCS Capital Corp RCAP are up more than 10 percent in Friday’s after-hours trading, after the company filed a Form 8-K with the SEC, disclosing unregistered sales of equity securities.

In addition, Christian Leone’s Luxor Capital Group disclosed, after the market closed, that it has almost tripled its exposure to the company. The fund now holds 23,903,714 shares of Class A common stock, up from 8,495,402 shares held by the end of the second quarter of the year.