- Joined
- May 29, 2009
- Messages
- 13,061
- Reaction score
- 5,128
- Location
- USA
- Gender
- Male
- Political Leaning
- Conservative
Add Aenta to the list of insurers with some serious concerns regarding the exchange business. They did well on other government plans, though.
The company said its overall profit leapt 38% in the final quarter of the year, as a key measure of spending on medical costs fell. The strong quarterly results were fueled largely by its government business, which includes Medicare and Medicaid.
Aetna said it ended 2015 with about a million customers enrolled in individual health plans—roughly three-quarters of those through the ACA exchanges—and doesn’t expect material growth in the first quarter.
Though the segment’s fourth-quarter performance was a bit better than Aetna last projected, the business lost money in 2015, with a negative margin of around 3% to 4% for the year. Aetna said it aims to get its individual-plan business to break-even in 2016, helped by moves that included withdrawing from some states and rate increases
But Aetna Chief Executive Mark T. Bertolini said during a call with analysts that the company has “serious concerns about the sustainability of the public exchanges” and wants to see more regulatory moves to improve the ACA marketplaces for insurers. The company said tweaks made so far by the Obama administration have been promising but not enough to affect Aetna’s financial projections.
In an interview, Chief Financial Officer Shawn M. Guertin said it was too soon to say what Aetna’s presence on the ACA exchanges would look like in 2017, and the company will need to assess the business going forward. “It’s premature to declare victory or defeat,” he said.