Here’s how major health insurers’ stock performed in June 2024. Elevance Health, Inc. had the highest closing stock price among major commercial insurers as of June 28, 2024, at $541.86. Humana Inc. had the highest closing stock price among major Medicare insurers at $373.65.

Despite reporting a strong balance sheet for the second quarter of 2024, Elevance Health, Inc. faced a selloff that seemed to be prompted by higher-than-expected utilization in the insurer’s Medicaid book of business. On July 17, the day that Elevance reported its results, its stock price dropped by $32.21 over the full day of trading, a 5.82% decrease, to settle at $520.93 — despite year-over-year increases in operating gain and operating margin, as well as better-than-expected medical loss ratio (MLR) performance.

Elevance took in $43.2 billion in operating revenue in the quarter, down $200 million year over year. Its operating gain increased by $200 million year over year to $2.8 billion, and operating margin increased by 0.3% year over year to 6.4%. Elevance posted an MLR of 86.3%, below the Wall Street consensus of 86.4%.

Here’s how major health insurers’ stock performed in May 2024. Elevance Health, Inc. had the highest closing stock price among major commercial insurers as of May 31, 2024, at $538.48. Humana Inc. had the highest closing stock price among major Medicare insurers at $358.12.

Months after rumors of a brewing deal with Humana Inc. generated a spate of headlines, The Cigna Group’s chief financial officer is signaling clearly that the company isn’t eager to jump into the mergers and acquisitions game until the conditions are just right.

“We continue to view inorganic activity through the lens of, it needs to be strategically attractive for the company,” CFO Brian Evanko said during a question-and-answer session with analyst Nathan Rich during the Goldman Sachs Global Healthcare Conference on June 11.

Humana Inc. shareholders, led by an ironworkers’ annuity fund, have filed a proposed class-action lawsuit against the companies’ top executives. The suit, filed on June 3 in the U.S. District Court the District of Delaware, accuses Humana CEO Bruce Broussard and Chief Financial Officer Susan Diamond of violating the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 by making false and misleading statements that downplayed pressures on Humana’s earnings from heightened health care utilization among Medicare Advantage members. When it became clear that the uptick in utilization was a durable trend that significantly affected its financial results, the company’s stock values fell, causing shareholders to lose money, the suit claims. The litigation comes after UnitedHealth Group investors filed suit against that company alleging it made false and misleading statements to shareholders in the months between when it learned about a Dept. of Justice investigation and when that probe became public.

Although UnitedHealth Group CEO Andrew Witty caused a brief health insurer stock selloff with his remarks about a Medicaid “disturbance,” both his company and other managed care powerhouses have since been busy trying to reassure jittery investors.

The trouble started on May 29, when Witty was answering questions from analyst Lance Wilkes during the Bernstein Strategic Decisions Conference. Witty pointed out that “there’s probably going to be some disturbance around” syncing Medicaid managed care payment rates with the heightened costs associated with covering Medicaid enrollees, now that millions of people have been dropped from the rolls during the “unwinding” process.

During the Bernstein Strategic Decisions Conference, CVS Health Corp. executives directly addressed the company’s rumored desire to find a private equity partner to fund the growth of its Oak Street Health clinics. Meanwhile, managed care stocks took a hit after UnitedHealth Group CEO Andrew Witty called out reimbursement headwinds associated with Medicaid eligibility redeterminations.

“There’s been a lot of inquiries, you know, based on some recent press reports on Oak Street,” CVS Chief Financial Officer Tom Cowhey said during a May 29 “fireside chat” with Bernstein analyst Lance Wilkes and CVS CEO Karen Lynch. Bloomberg reported on May 23 that the company has reached out to a handful of private equity firms in a bid to generate more capital to support new, senior-focused primary care clinics under the Oak Street brand.

Although the outcome of a Dept. of Justice investigation into UnitedHealth Group is far from certain, it recently led UnitedHealth shareholders to file a lawsuit claiming that the company deceived investors before the DOJ investigation came to light.

In February, news broke that the DOJ had been quietly looking into UnitedHealth’s buyup of physician practices — including how that vertical consolidation affects rival providers and health insurers — as well as Medicare Advantage billing issues. UnitedHealth’s shares tumbled on the news, which came to light after the New York-based Examiner News obtained an internal email showing the firm first became aware of the investigation in October 2023.

Although insurers have bet big — and cashed in — on privatized Medicare and Medicaid plans, recently those business lines have shown some signs of distress.

For example, Humana Inc. and CVS Health Corp.’s Aetna this week put concrete numbers behind the Medicare Advantage membership losses that they expect to sustain next year due to significant headwinds facing the MA industry. And heightened medical loss ratios in managed Medicaid dinged the otherwise solid first-quarter 2024 financial results recently reported by Centene Corp. and Molina Healthcare, Inc.

Ousting CVS Health Corp.’s Aetna from the current roster of Medicaid managed care organizations serving the Kansas Medicaid program, Elevance Health, Inc.’s Healthy Blue was chosen as the third insurer for new KanCare contracts starting Jan. 1, 2025. Incumbents Sunflower Health Plan (Centene Corp.) and UnitedHealthcare Community Plan held onto their spots. The awards mark the latest in a string of wins for Centene and Elevance and another disappointment for Aetna.

According to results posted by the Kansas Dept. of Health and Environment on May 14, seven MCOs responded to the request for proposals (RFP) process that began in October 2023 after a delay. Serving nearly 154,000 enrollees, UnitedHealthcare currently has the biggest share of the Kansas Medicaid market, per AIS’s Directory of Health Plans. Aetna, meanwhile, serves nearly 133,000, or about 31% of KanCare enrollees.