Thursday's Small-Cap Winners & Losers

Small-cap stocks traded higher for most of the day before taking a hard fall along with the major indices, and Virgin Mobile USA (VM Quote) was among the winners after its initial public offering.

The prepaid-wireless outfit priced 27.5 million shares at $15 a pop, mostly from the company itself, for trade on the New York Stock Exchange. Underwriters have a 30-day option for about another 4.1 million shares to cover overallotments. Shares of the Warren, N.J., company were recently up 3.7% to $15.55.

Newpark Resources (NR Quote), Texas-based purveyor of services to the oil and gas industry, jumped 10.6% to $6.26 after agreeing to sell its U.S. Environmental Services business for $81.5 million in cash to Trinity TLM Acquisitions. The deal, which will probably close by year-end, also includes a five-year earn-out provision potentially worth up to $8 million.

Agfeed Industries (FEED Quote), a China-based animal-feed company, leapt 7.2% to $12.85 after Nasdaq approved it for listing on its Global Market index. The change will effect at open of business on Friday.

Among the losers, however, was Ruby Tuesday (RT Quote). Shares of the restaurant chain sank 14.4% after it pocketed just $11.1 million, or 21 cents a share, in the fiscal first quarter. That's nearly half of year-ago earnings, and it comes in a penny shy of Thomson Financial's per-share analyst expectations.