By: Liz Hoffman, Brent Kendall, and Anna Wilde Matthews

June 19, 2016

U.S. antitrust regulators have privately expressed concerns about Anthem Inc.’s $48 billion proposed acquisition of Cigna Corp., and are skeptical that the health insurers can offer concessions that would fully preserve competition in the industry, according to people familiar with the matter.

Company representatives met June 10 in Washington with Justice Department staffers and representatives of more than a dozen state attorneys general, the people said. At the meeting, government officials outlined their worries about combining two of the nation’s top health insurers, the people said.

Merging companies sometimes can win government approval by offering to sell assets or agreeing to other restrictions on their operations, but government staffers told the companies they weren’t optimistic Anthem and Cigna could offer satisfactory fixes, the people said.

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By: David McLaughlin

Andrew Harris

Bloomberg

08/5/16

The judge overseeing two U.S. cases challenging mergers among four of the biggest health insurers gave up one, improving the odds for rulings on both tie-ups by the end of the year and reducing the chance they fall apart beforehand.

U.S. District Judge John Bates in Washington said Friday he would keep the case against Aetna Inc.’s deal for Humana Inc., leaving the challenge to Anthem Inc.’s takeover of Cigna Corp. to another judge. Bates kept the Aetna case because it’s on a tighter deadline with its merger agreement expiring at the end of the year.

“Given the complexity and importance of these cases, the court cannot feasibly try and decide both in that time frame,” the judge wrote in a ruling. “Ultimately, it will be fairer to the parties and better for the public if one of the cases is randomly reassigned to another judge in this district, who can give it prompt and full attention while this judge does the same with the other.”

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By: Amy Yurkanin

Al.com

08/08/2016

Blue Cross Blue Shield of Alabama is seeking an average rate increase of 39 percent on individual plans offered through the Obamacare marketplace, according to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services.

The proposed rate hikes will affect more than 160,000 people in Alabama who purchase insurance through the federal exchange, or about 5 percent of Blue Cross membership.

Rate increases range from 26 to 41 percent, depending on the type of plan. Proposed increases are lowest for bronze plans, which offer the least amount of coverage, and greatest for the most popular silver plans.

Blue Cross is the only insurance company that will offer Alabamians individual insurance plans through the exchange next year after the departure of Humana and UnitedHealth. Those departures were announced earlier this year.

The hefty rate hikes for Blue Cross customers will come on the heels of another increase in 2016 that averaged 28 percent for individual plans. The company lost more than $250 million on marketplace plans from 2014 to 2016, according to Blue Cross executives.

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