BUZZ-Equifax: Falling again as hack attack prompts trading volume spike

(Adds data on Thursday volume, price after trading opens) ** Equifax (NYSE: EFX - news) shares down 7.8 pct to $91.22 on Thursday morning, as heavy trading in the stock continues

** Stock touches lowest point since Feb 2015 and is now down about 36 pct since data breach news announced on Sept 7

** Since breach news, stock has had four out of five busiest volume days in its history, according to Thomson Reuters (Dusseldorf: TOC.DU - news) data, and on pace for another extremely heavy day on Thursday

** Trading volume in first five minutes of Thursday trading alone topped its daily trading average dating back to 1980

** In total in the four completed sessions since the breach, 51 mln shares have changed hands, nearly half of the 120 mln shares outstanding, according to TR data

** EFX shares had their busiest trading day ever on Wednesday, with 17.5 mln shares traded, as stock fell below $100 for first time since Feb 2016

** Nearly 40 states have joined a probe of Equifax's handling of a massive data breach that exposed valuable information of up to 143 mln Americans

** "Once they came out and announced this, from a PR perspective they have really kind of mishandled the news on this front," Morningstar (NasdaqGS: MORN - news) analyst Brett Horn said. "They just haven’t been able to kind of get in front of this."

** Shares (Berlin: DI6.BE - news) of credit reporting company TransUnion (Berlin: 13331323.BE - news) down 16 pct since news of Equifax breach

** YTD, Equifax shares down 22.8 pct vs 34.3 pct rise for TransUnion