Wednesday, July 29, 2009

Writing on the Wall

The people driving Wall Street are usually a good predictor of what's going to happen in the near term with respect to laws and changes that will impact private industry. It looks as if they are seeing a big win for the health insurance industry and a big lose for we the people. Now that we see that a public option is not a part of the Senate plan we, like Wall Street, can begin to see who is going to benefit if the public option gets dropped from health care reform. Clue: It ain't us.

Shares of U.S. health insurers rose broadly on Tuesday on hopes a health reform bill would not include a government-run option, which has drawn strong opposition from insurers who fear it would destroy the private marketplace.

The S&P Managed Health Care index of large U.S. health insurers closed 6.5 percent higher.

Aetna rose 12.6 percent, Coventry was up 12.7 percent and Cigna was 7.7 percent higher, all on the New York Stock Exchange. Centene rose 7.9 percent.

If you want to bet against yourself then it looks like the health insurance stocks are the way to go. Maybe you can make enough profit to pay for your medical care.

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