Dive Brief:
- United Health Group has announced that its earnings for the fourth quarter of fiscal 2013 climbed by almost 15%.
- Its quarterly earnings rose from about $1.24 billion in 2012 to $1.43 billion for fiscal 2013; overall performance improved by 1.8%.
- The company reported $31.1 billion in total revenue for the last quarter of 2013, or 8.2% more than the $28.8 billion reported in 2012. These results came partly due to increase in enrollment, which grew by 170,000 beneficiaries in this quarter, part of forces leading to a year-end enrollee total of 45 million during 2013.
Dive Insight:
For UHG, this has certainly been a quarter to be happy about, but it comes amidst other negative trends. In December 2013, UHG said that it expects its per-share profit and revenue for 2014 to be lower than what financial analysts were predicting, Becker's Hospital Review reports. UnitedHealth CEO Stephen Hemsley told Wall Street that lower Medicare Advantage reimbursement and the rollout of the ACA were the biggest forces affecting 2014 performance. Given that both of these are forces largely beyond UHG's control, we could see some unpretty things happen to the company's performance and in the coming year.