DAILY UPDATE: JPMorgan Chase Lawsuit as DJIA Gains 350 Points and Stocks Climb for 2nd Day After S&P 500 Enters Correction Territory

Posted on March 18, 2025 by Dr. David Edward Marcinko MBA MEd CMP™

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A group of current and former employees of JPMorgan Chase (NYSE:JPM) has filed a lawsuit alleging that the company, through its prescription drug plan run by CVS Health (NYSE:CVS), overpaid for medicines, resulting in higher expenses for its workers, according to Bloomberg News.

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The S&P 500 (^GSPC) gained about 0.6% to rebound for a second day in row, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI) gained more than 350 points, or more than 0.8%. The tech-heavy NASDAQ Composite (^IXIC) rose 0.3% as “Magnificent 7” stocks, including Nvidia (NVDA) and Tesla (TSLA), faltered.

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Visualize: How private equity tangled banks in a web of debt, from the Financial Times.

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DAILY UPDATE: Federal Health Agencies and PBMs as Technology Stock Plunge!

Posted on January 28, 2025 by Dr. David Edward Marcinko MBA MEd CMP™

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Federal health agencies are canceled—well, their meetings are at least. In the days following his inauguration, President Donald Trump’s administration asked officials within the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS)—which has a $1.7 trillion budget and includes the FDA, the CDC, and the National Institutes of Health (NIH)—to stop all external communication, according to an internal memo. This means no new health advisories, social media posts, or website posts.

“As the new administration considers its plan for managing the federal policy and public communications processes, it is important that the president’s appointees and designees have the opportunity to review and approve any regulations, guidance documents, and other public documents and communications (including social media),” the memo read. The pause began on Jan. 21st, and according to the memo, will remain in effect until Feb. 1st

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The FTC’s second interim staff report on consolidated pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs) found that the three largest of these middlemen—CVS Health’s Caremark Rx, Cigna Group’s Express Scripts, and UnitedHealth Group’s OptumRx—”marked up two specialty generic cancer drugs by thousands of percent and then paid their affiliated pharmacies hundreds of millions of dollars of dispensing revenue in excess of estimated acquisition costs for each drug annually.”

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The NASDAQ tanked on Monday as a Chinese startup rattled faith in US leadership and profitability in AI, taking a hammer to Nvidia (NVDA), wiping out a record $589 billion in market value. The NASDAQ Composite (^IXIC) sank more than 3%, while the S&P 500 (^GSPC) dropped nearly 1.5%. The blue-chip Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI), which is less dependent tech stocks gained more than 0.6% as investors flocked to defensive sectors. Shares of Apple (AAPL) and software giant Salesforce (CRM) also bucked the tech rout.

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Visualize: How private equity tangled banks in a web of debt, from the Financial Times.

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DAILY UPDATE: CVS Health and AI Healthcare Chatbots as Stocks Reach New Highs

Posted on October 19, 2024 by Dr. David Edward Marcinko MBA MEd CMP™

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CVS Health may be breaking up…with itself. The board of directors at CVS Health—the parent company of CVS Pharmacy, pharmacy benefit manager CVS Caremark, and insurance unit Aetna—are working with a group of bankers to review the company’s strategy, which according to Reuters, may lead to a split between its pharmacy division and Aetna.

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Stocks Up

  • Apple climbed 1.23% on a Bloomberg report that iPhone 16 demand has been shockingly strong in China.
  • Verizon Communications will purchase $1 billion worth of US Cellular’s wireless spectrum licenses. Verizon rose just 0.34%—but it’s a huge deal for US Cellular, which popped 7.22%, and Telephone and Data Systems, which owns 82% of US Cellular, and soared 15.40%.
  • Intuitive Surgical rose to a new all-time high, climbing 10.01% on strong earnings powered by sales of its da Vinci device.
  • Lamb Weston, the company behind the french fries you overindulge in every time you go out to dinner, is being pushed by activist investor Jana Partners toward exploring a sale. Shareholders rejoiced, and the stock rose 10.17%.

Stocks Down

CVS Health sank 5.23% on the news that CEO Karen Lynch will be replaced by David Joyner after three years at the helm of the struggling pharmacy/retailer. Joyner ran the company’s pharmacy service business for the last two years.

  • WD-40 seems like the staple of all consumer staples, but the company missed on both revenue and earnings estimates last quarter. Shares fell 4.79% on the news.
  • American Express dropped 3.15% after the credit card company reported a rare miss today, beating bottom-line estimates but missing revenue forecasts last quarter.
  • MGP Ingredients makes all the booze you drink under different brand names, but people aren’t drinking enough. The beverage maker issued preliminary earnings that included a 24% drop in sales. Shares tanked 24.16%.

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Here’s where the major stock market benchmarks ended:

  • The S&P 500® index (SPX)rose 23.20 points (0.40%) to 5,864.67, a new record high close, to end the week up 0.85%; the Dow Jones Industrial Average® ($DJI) added 36.86 points (0.09%) to 43,275.91, also another record high finish, to end the week up 0.96%; and the $COMP gained 115.94 points (0.63%) to 18,489.55 to end the week up 0.80%.
  • The 10-year Treasury note yield (TNX) fell two basis points to 4.07%.
  • The CBOE Volatility Index® (VIX) fell to 18.17, the lowest since September 30.

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A new survey results may prompt health systems to second-guess some of their future plans. A recent University of Michigan survey found 74% of adults ages 50+ have “very little or no trust” in health info generated by AI. Maybe it’s not time to roll out chatbots on patient portals just yet.

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POPULATION HEALTH: Management?

Posted on June 18, 2024 by Dr. David Edward Marcinko MBA MEd CMP™

By Dr. David Edward Marcinko MBA CMP

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What is population health management?

The Care Continuum Alliance, an alliance of stakeholders across the continuum of care, is working precisely toward the goal of improving the health of populations. They espouse a detailed set of principles and a model of “population health management.” It can be summed up, in the broadest sense, as the care provider community, in partnership with patients and their families, conducting proactive and collective monitoring of the patient’s healthcare quality, adherence, access, and outcomes with the goal of improving the health of an entire patient population.

As such, population health management stresses wellness and prevention through lifestyle and disease management and complex case management to remove the gap between zero care and costly chronic or emergency care. It emphasizes the full spectrum of needs from prevention and wellness to keeping healthy people and at-risk people healthy, to better manage the care of those with chronic conditions, and to still be ready to provide emergent or acute care services. In most cases, it also includes the involved providers taking on accountability for the financial risk and quality of care provided.

We have been working with administrative and physician leaders across the country to grapple with what it will mean to actually foster valuable population health management in the different communities they serve. It is clear that this is a whole new paradigm and that the years of experience and training that have brought them to where they are today may not have sufficiently prepared them for what is to come. It requires a well-coordinated and complete continuum of care, with new metrics and advanced analytics. As one might expect,while clusters of resistance to the idea remain, most have flung themselves into learning mode and are beginning to “act their way into new thinking.”

However, we also see a big risk in powering ahead without revisiting the role of a key stakeholder group—patients and their families, whose experience and perspective are often left behind, but whose actions will have a profound effect on the future success of population health management efforts.

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PODCASTS: The Physician-Patient Population Health Mis-Match

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Its earnings season once again and CVS Health beat Wall Street estimates with $2.3 billion in profit during Q3. Humana raised its Medicare Advantage enrollment projections again.

And, population management telehealth giant Amwell inked a major federal contract but has seen its losses balloon in 2023.

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PODCAST: CVS Corporate History

Posted on April 22, 2024 by Dr. David Edward Marcinko MBA MEd CMP™

By Eric Bricker MD

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DAILY UPDATE: Medicare Advantage Plans Down as Stocks Crash

Posted on April 3, 2024 by Dr. David Edward Marcinko MBA MEd CMP™

By Staff Reporters

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Medicare Part C papers, glasses and stethoscope.

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Humana and other managed-care stocks were down sharply in trading Tuesday after the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services announced an average 3.7% increase in revenue for Medicare Advantage plans in 2025. That amount is the same as the proposed increase the government had announced in January, but it came as a shock to investors who were hoping for a slight bump.

Humana  (HUM)  shares fell sharply in early Tuesday trading, while rivals UnitedHealth UNH and CVS Health  (CVS)  traded firmly in the red, as the health insurance industry received yet another blow to its 2024 profit forecasts. All three major health insurance groups have trailed the broader market this year, with Humana down nearly 25%, amid concern that profit margins will be hit by a surge in medical costs tied to a rise in elective procedures. Those procedures had been delayed by the Covid pandemic. 

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Here’s where the major benchmarks ended:

  • The S&P 500 index fell 37.96 points (0.7%) to 5,205.81; the Dow Jones Industrial Average lost 396.61 points (1.0%) to 39,170.24; the NASDAQ Composite slipped 156.38 points (1.0%) to 16,240.45.
  • The 10-year Treasury note yield was up almost 3 basis points to 4.357%.
  • The CBOE Volatility Index® (VIX) rose 0.96 to 14.61.

Retailer, biotechnology, and regional bank shares were among the weakest performers Tuesday, leading a broad market slump in which declining stocks outnumber advancers by a greater than three-to-one ratio. The small-cap Russell 2000® Index (RUT) lost 1.8% and settled at a two-week low. 

Energy companies, by contrast, extended recent strength behind an ongoing climb in WTI Crude Oil (/CL) futures, which surpassed $85 per barrel for the first time since late October. The Philadelphia Oil Service Index (OSX) advanced 2.1% and ended at a 5-½-month high. Oil prices have surged this year due to OPEC production cuts and concern over supply disruptions stemming from the Middle East conflict.

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PODCAST: CVS Health PBM Change Pricing

Posted on February 27, 2024 by Dr. David Edward Marcinko MBA MEd CMP™

By Eric Bricker MD

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DAILY UPDATE: Consumer Spending Down While CVS Earnings Up

Posted on February 20, 2024 by Dr. David Edward Marcinko MBA MEd CMP™

By Staff Reporters

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To See What’s Next For Consumer Spending, Take a Closer Look at High ...
  • Stat: 0.8%. That’s how much consumer spending fell in January 204—a much bigger dip than expected (CNBC).

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CVS reported strong results for its healthcare segment in 2023, showing a 10.2% increase in revenue compared to the prior year. Still, executives lowered the segment’s 2024 guidance in anticipation of rising medical costs, according to earnings released this month.

Finally, the US stock market reopens today after the long weekend, and everyone’s still talking about the Magnificent Seven. That’s because, according to a new report from Deutsche Bank, profits at these seven tech giants are greater than the profits of all publicly traded companies in nearly every G20 country. And in terms of market value, they’d be the second-largest national stock exchange in the world. Goldman Sachs sees this party lasting all night: It raised its 2024 target for the S&P 500 for the second time.

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Healthcare Corporate Business Updates

Posted on February 10, 2024 by Dr. David Edward Marcinko MBA MEd CMP™

By Staff Reporters

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Walgreens tapped Mary Langowski, a former CVS Health executive, to lead its U.S. healthcare segment. The move comes as the retail pharmacy giant looks to boost profitability in its healthcare business.

CVS Health cut its outlook for 2024 on the back of higher medical costs in the fourth quarter. The drugstore chain, which owns Aetna, joins other healthcare companies to see a spike in utilization.

And … following up on a federal law passed in September to increase competition among organ transplant contractors, HRSA is issuing requests for proposals for several different contracts.

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DAILY UPDATE: Healthcare Artificial Intelligence Safety as the DJIA Sets Record

Posted on December 15, 2023 by Dr. David Edward Marcinko MBA MEd CMP™

By Staff Reporters

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Twenty-eight healthcare companies, including CVS Health , are signing U.S. President Joe Biden’s voluntary commitments aimed at ensuring the safe development of artificial intelligence (AI), a White House official said yesterday. The commitments by healthcare providers and payers follow those of 15 leading AI companies, including Google, OpenAI and OpenAI partner Microsoft to develop AI healthcare models responsibly.

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Health insurance company Humana is being accused of allegedly wrongfully denying care to elderly patients, who are enrolled in Medicare Advantage Plans, using an augmented intelligence model “to override” physicians’ orders on “necessary care patients require,” according to a new lawsuit.

The lawsuit, filed by two Humana Medicare Advantage Plan customers on December th 12 in Kentucky, claims that Humana uses an AI model called nH Predict, and it allegedly has a high error rate. And allegedly, despite knowing that it’s inaccurate, the company still uses it.

Related: CVS, Kroger and Rite Aid face unsettling medical privacy concerns

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Here is where the major benchmarks ended:

The S&P 500 index was up 12.46 points (0.3%) at 4,719.55; the Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 158.11 points (0.4%) at 37,248.35; the NASDAQ Composite® (COMP) was up 27.59 points (0.2%) at 14,761.56.

  • The 10-year Treasury note yield (TNX) was down about 11 basis points at 3.923%, falling under 4% for the first time since early August.
  • The CBOE® Volatility Index (VIX) was up 0.25 at 12.44.

Financial shares remained among the market’s strongest post-FOMC gainers, reflecting ideas that lower interest rates will boost profit margins for banks. Goldman Sachs (GS) rallied nearly 6%, the second-best gain among Dow companies, and hit a 23-month high. The KBW Bank Index (BKX), which includes major companies like Bank of America (BAC) and Citigroup (C) as well as several regional lenders, surged 5% to a nine-month high.

Also, the small-cap Russell 2000® Index (RUT) continued to outgain large-cap counterparts, rising 2.7% to a 4 ½-month high.

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PHARMACISTS: Stage CVS Health Walk-Out?

Posted on September 25, 2023 by Dr. David Edward Marcinko MBA MEd CMP™

By Staff Reporters

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Nearly two dozen pharmacists at the nation’s largest retail pharmacy chain staged a walkout in the Kansas City metro area this week over working conditions they say put CVS Health pharmacists and patients at risk. 

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The walkout began Thursday and continued into Friday. Organizers said they had shuttered numerous pharmacies across the metro area, which covers a portion of eastern Kansas and western Missouri. Some pharmacies outside the metro area also have joined. They estimated at least 22 locations had closed.

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While the group’s specific complaints focus on store staffing and quotas, the walkout reflects a rising outcry from pharmacists at several national pharmacy chains. They say their work requirements leave them unable to safely fill and verify prescriptions, putting patients at risk of serious harm or even death.

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RITE AID: Gets it Financially Wrong?

Posted on September 20, 2023 by Dr. David Edward Marcinko MBA MEd CMP™

By Staff Reporters

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Last quarter, interest expense grew to $65 million from $48 million last year, contributing to Rite Aid reporting a net loss of $306.7 million despite sales of $5.6 billion. Management forecasts a net loss of between $650 million and $680 million for the full fiscal year 2024. Rite Aid’s losses leave it with little financial wiggle room to navigate two significant headwinds: a looming lawsuit and increasing losses from theft.

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In March, for example, the Department of Justice filed a civil suit against Rite Aid, claiming pharmacists “repeatedly filled prescriptions for controlled substances with obvious red flags” and alleging it “intentionally deleted internal notes about suspicious prescribers.”

The lawsuit continues a string of high-profile cases brought against companies contributing to the spread of the opioid epidemic. Opioid drugmakers Purdue Pharma, Endo Pharmaceuticals, and Mallinckrodt have already declared bankruptcy because of lawsuits. Walgreens and CVS Health have inked opioid settlements valued at $5.7 billion and $4.9 billion over the past year.

How much Rite Aid would need to pay to settle its suit remains to be seen, but a billion-dollar price tag isn’t unfathomable, given Walgreens and CVS’ outcomes. 

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