UnitedHealth shares tumble 20% on annual earnings forecast cut, soft Q1 results

Investing.com -- UnitedHealth Group (NYSE: UNH) saw its shares slide 20% in premarket trading Thursday after the health insurance and service provider lowered its earnings outlook for the fiscal year 2025 and missed expectations for the first quarter.

The company now projects earnings per share (EPS) for the year to be in the range of $26.00 to $26.50, well below the previous outlook of $29.50 to $30 and missing the consensus forecast of $29.74.

UnitedHealth said Optum Health still expects to add 650,000 new patients under value-based care models this year.

For the first quarter of 2025, the company reported EPS of $7.20, falling short of the expected $7.29. Revenue for the period jumped 9.8% to $109.6 billion, but still missed the $111.5 billion expected by analysts.

“UnitedHealth Group grew to serve more people more comprehensively but did not perform up to our expectations, and we are aggressively addressing those challenges to position us well for the years ahead, and return to our long-term earnings growth rate target of 13 to 16%,” said Andrew Witty, CEO of UnitedHealth Group.

The company’s UnitedHealthcare segment generated revenue of $84.62 billion, up 12% from a year earlier and ahead of the $83.87 billion estimate. Revenue at the Optum unit rose 4.7% to $63.9 billion but came in below the expected $67.17 billion.

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