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In a surprise decision, which saw Chief Justice John Roberts side with the liberal contingency on the Supreme Court, the vast majority of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (better known as Obamacare) has been upheld -- including the individual mandate. The ruling has caused large moves in a number of subsectors in the health care industry. Several circuit breakers have been tripped in hospital stocks in particular, which have soared on the decision.
The Court's ruling will benefit hospitals because far fewer patients will be uninsured, reducing the number of patients who receive treatment and do not pay.
Among the winners are Tenet Healthcare
THC, which was up around 6% late Thursday morning to $5.27 and Community Health Systems
CYH, which jumped almost 7% to $27.20. Other hospital names that moved higher include Health Management Associates
HMA, HCA Holdings
HCA and LifePoint Hospitals
LPNT. An analyst on CNBC also said that Universal Health Services
UHS will be a beneficiary of the ruling. That stock was up a little better than 3% to $40.51.
Managed care and Medicaid stocks also reacted favorably to the ruling. Amerigroup
AGP was up almost 6%, Centene
CNC added nearly 7%, and Molina Healthcare
MOH was up 8%. Another name that surged was WellCare Health Plans
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, up more than 8% to $53.72. Commercial managed care stocks fell in the wake of the surprise decision.
WellPoint
WLP was halted at one point, and it was last trading down about 7%. Aetna
AET shares are traded lower, along with Coventry Health
CVH and UnitedHealth Group
UNH. Managed care and Medicaid stocks such as Humana
HUM and Universal American Corp.
UAM were mixed. Humana shares had lost 3% to just over $77.00, while Universal American was up slightly on the news.
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