Ralph J. Nicoletti
Analyst · Deutsche Bank
Thanks, David. Good morning, everyone. In my remarks today, I will review Cigna's full year 2011 results and also discuss our outlook for the full year 2012, including contributions from the HealthSpring acquisition. In my review of consolidated and segment results, I will comment on adjusted income from operations. This is also the basis on which I'll provide our earnings outlook. We had a very strong 2011, driven by effective execution of our strategy and are carrying solid momentum into this year. Our 2011 results include several key accomplishments, specifically top line growth for each of our targeted businesses, attractive organic membership growth in our targeted markets, Health Care earnings growth of 15%, International earnings growth of 19%, earnings per share growth of 12%, just to name a few. Our fourth quarter results were in line with our expectation, and we generated strong overall revenue and earnings contributions while making significant strategic investments in capabilities in each of our businesses. Our full year 2011 consolidated revenues were $22 billion. Revenues reflect growth in premium and fees of 6% in Health Care, 32% in International and 4% in Group Disability and Life, driven by continued success in our targeted customer segments. Full year consolidated earnings for 2011 were $1.43 billion, compared to $1.28 billion in 2010. Earnings per share for 2011 was $5.21 per share, a 12% increase over 2010, reflecting strong earnings from each of our ongoing businesses. Our 2011 earnings per share were $5.24, adjusting for the dilution of approximately $0.03 per share related to the shares issued in the fourth quarter for the HealthSpring acquisition. Turning to Health Care. 2011 premiums and fees grew to $13.2 billion, representing a 6% increase from 2010. Full year Health Care earnings were $990 million and reflect contributions from sustained growth in our medical and specialty businesses, as well as the impact of favorable prior year development. Importantly, we have increased our spending on strategic investments in the fourth quarter in branding and technology to support future growth in membership and capabilities. These increased investments amounted to $40 million before tax or approximately $0.09 a share on an after-tax basis. We ended 2011 with 11.5 million Health Care members, which is approximately 2% higher than year end 2010. As David noted, our membership growth is aligned with our Go Deep strategy with the particularly strong results in our middle-market and select segments, where we offer clients differentiated funding alternatives and product solutions through a consultative and incentive-based approach. Now turning to medical cost, in 2011, we achieved a competitively attractive commercial, medical cost trend of approximately 5% for our total book of business. I would remind you that approximately 90% of our customers are in funding arrangements were they directly benefit from these medical trend results. Across our risk book of business, our fourth quarter earnings include: Favorable prior period claim development of $24 million after-tax. For the full year 2011, the impact of favorable prior year claim development was $53 million after-tax, including a negligible amount in the fourth quarter. Specific to commercial guaranteed costs, our full year 2011 medical care ratio or MCR was 79.7% on a reported basis. Excluding prior year claim development, the commercial guaranteed costs, MCR for 2011 was 80.9%, including the effect of our rebate accrual. Overall, we are pleased with our results in our medical risk business as they continually reflect good pricing and underwriting discipline, as well as sustained clinical quality for our clients and customers. For the full year 2011, total operating expense ratio was 27.2%, which is a 50 basis-point improvement over the 2010 expense ratio. Now, I will discuss the results in our other segments. Cigna's International business continues to deliver attractive growth and profitability. The results reflect strong retention and further product penetration of existing customers, as well as targeted new sales. Premiums and fees for 2011, totaled $3 billion, up 32% year-over-year, driven by strong customer retention and growth within our Health, Life and Accident business and our Global Health Benefits business. Our top line growth drove earnings of $289 million in 2011, which represents a strong 19% increase over 2010. Full year results were driven by strong customer retention and growth in Health, Life and Accident and Global Health Benefits businesses, partially offset by an elevated MCR in our Global Health Benefits business, in part due to business mix, as well as higher spending on strategic initiatives. Our earnings in the fourth quarter were consistent with our expectations and demonstrate continued success in the marketplace. These results reflect solid top and bottom line growth, partially offset by continued strategic investments for future growth, some costs to streamline operation and unfavorable changes in foreign tax law. All totaling approximately $10 million after-tax or about $0.03 a share. In our Group Disability and Life segment, premiums and fees for 2011 were $2.8 billion. Group premium and fees increased 4%, including 9% growth in our targeted Disability business. Full year 2011 earnings were $282 million, which was in line with our expectation and a good result in the challenging economic environment. We continue to deliver value through our market-leading Disability and Productivity Management model, which focuses on early customer engagement and leverages Cigna's proven clinical capabilities. Full year 2011 earnings also reflect favorable Life and Accident experience, partially offset by higher disability claims, as well as the impact of strategic investments. Finally, I would remind you that fourth quarter 2010 earnings included an after-tax gain of $11 million from the sale of a workers' compensation and case management business. Results for our remaining operations including Run-off Reinsurance, Other Operations and Corporate, total to an after-tax loss of $133 million for the full year 2011. The full year 2011 results includes the third quarter reserves strengthening related to our run-off VADBe book of business. No additional VADBe reserve strengthening was required in the fourth quarter. Overall, our 2011 results reflect strong revenue and earnings contributions from each of our ongoing businesses and these businesses continue to generate significant free cash flow. Turning to our investment portfolio. We're pleased with our results in 2011. For the full year, we recognized net-realized investment gains of $41 million after-tax, coupled with strong net investment income results. Our commercial mortgage loan portfolio continues to perform well within a challenging economic environment. And overall, we continue to be pleased with the quality and diversification of our investment portfolio. Our strong investment management capabilities and disciplined approach to risk management have delivered solid results. Before turning to our 2012 outlook, I'll now provide an update regarding our acquisition of HealthSpring. We are pleased to announce this week that we closed the transaction on January 31, a very good outcome from a timing perspective. We have been engaged with HealthSpring management -- with the HealthSpring management team on integration, and plans to recognize significant growth opportunities as well as cost efficiencies over time. Consistent with our previous discussions, we expect the acquisition to be earnings accretive in the first full year and highly accretive on a cash basis. I'll provide some color on the expected HealthSpring contributions in my discussion on the 2012 outlook. So now turning to 2012. We're carrying solid momentum into the year from strong membership-driven revenue growth, earnings growth off a strong 2011 and strategic investments that could provide sustained growth into the future, most significantly the HealthSpring acquisition. This outlook reflects our expectation that the global economic conditions will remain challenging and that the U.S. unemployment rate remains essentially unchanged. Based on our current view, for the full year 2012, we expect consolidated adjusted income from operations of $1.46 billion to $1.57 billion and EPS of $5 to $5.40 per share, reflecting continued, strong underlying results in each of our ongoing businesses. Adjusted for reserve -- adjusted for prior year reserve development and VADBe reserve strengthening, this represents growth of 2% to 10% in earnings per share over 2011. I would remind you that consistent with our prior practices, our outlook excludes any contribution from future reserve development or capital deployment. For our Health Care business, including the impact of HealthSpring, we expect full year 2011 -- 2012 earnings in the range of $1.12 billion to $1.19 billion compared to 2011 results of $937 million excluding prior year claim development. This outlook reflects continued benefits from customer-driven revenue growth, specialty contribution and operating expense leverage. I'll now summarize some of the key assumptions reflected in our Health Care earnings outlook for 2012, starting with membership. We anticipate full year 2012 membership growth of approximately 900,000, driven by organic growth and the addition of customers through the HealthSpring acquisition. We expect government medical membership to grow by approximately 400,000. HealthSpring added 365,000 Medicare Advantage customers at the acquisition date, and we expect some additional Medicare Advantage and Medicaid membership growth during the year. We expect commercial medical membership to grow by approximately 500,000, which is higher than what we had previously discussed. This growth is across all our targeted market segments and essentially all in our ASO funding arrangement. We expect the majority of that growth to be delivered in the first quarter. Turning to medical cost. Our outlook assumes an increase in medical services utilization during 2012. For our total commercial book of business, we expect full year medical cost trend to be in the range of 6% to 7%, which is above the amounts we realized in 2011. These expected medical costs have been reflected in our pricing for 2012. Based on these factors and changing business mix, we would expect the full year MCR to be in the range of 81% to 82% for our commercial guaranteed book of business, which is approximately 50 basis points higher than the full year 2011 results, excluding prior year development. Our Medicare Advantage MCR for the full year is expected to be in the range of 81.5% to 82.5%. Regarding operating expenses for full year 2012, we expect the total Health Care operating expense ratio to be in the range of 22.5% to 23.5%, based on our current outlook for membership growth and business mix. Pulling the pieces together, we expect full year 2012 Health Care earnings, including HealthSpring, to be in the range of $1.12 billion to $1.19 billion. We expect HealthSpring to contribute $160 million to $180 million to Health Care segment earnings, excluding transaction costs that will be reported as a special item. The 2012 earnings contribution from HealthSpring reflects approximately $130 million after-tax or $0.45 per share for depreciation and an amortization expense. This acquisition has significant strategic value and is immediately accretive. And in addition, on a cash basis, we expect to realize approximately 10% accretion in 2012. Now moving to the other components of our outlook. For our International business, we expect continued strong top line growth and earnings in the range of $265 million to $285 million, which represents continued attractive growth on top of the strong 2011 earnings of $219 million, adjusted for their required accounting change for deferred acquisition costs adopted in 2012. This outlook reflects continued strength in both our Health, Life and Accident and Global Health Benefits businesses. The outlook also includes the impact of increased investments and new market expansion, as well as ongoing contributions from the Vanbreda acquisition. Regarding Vanbreda, while we saw better-than-expected earnings in -- earnings contributions in 2011 associated with this acquisition, we estimate that the earnings contributions in 2012 will be consistent with 2011, which is less than our original expectation due in part to competitive pricing pressures, as well as a lower level of internalization of the insurance underwriting for some of our clients. We continue to view the strategic rationale and long-term growth opportunities for this business as attractive. Importantly, overall, we expect International earnings growth of 21% to 30% for 2012, with growth in both our Health, Life and Accident and Global Health Benefits businesses. For our Group Disability and Life business, we expect full year 2012 earnings in the range of $260 million to $280 million, which reflects the competitively attractive result in a continued challenging economic environment. This outlook for Group assumes revenue growth for both our Disability and Life books and strong execution of our Disability Management model, as well as increased investment in customer-facing capabilities. Regarding our remaining operations, including Run-off Reinsurance, Other Operations and Corporate, we expect a loss of $185 million for 2012, inclusive of additional interest expense of approximately $55 million after-tax, associated with the incremental debt issued to finance the HealthSpring acquisition. So all in for 2012, we expect consolidated adjusted income from operations of $1.46 billion to $1.57 billion and consolidated EPS in the range of $5 to $5.40 a share. I'll now discuss our capital management position and outlook. Overall, we continue to have good financial flexibility as our subsidiaries remain well-capitalized and are generating significant free cash flow to the parent, reflecting the strong return on capital in each of our ongoing businesses. Regarding the HealthSpring acquisition, we have put in place a financing structure that allows us to maintain good financial flexibility. We ended 2011 with parent company cash of approximately $3.8 billion, which was used to fund the HealthSpring acquisition. And for the full year 2012, we expect some subsidiary dividends of approximately $1.3 billion. After funding the HealthSpring acquisition, as well as other sources and uses of capital in 2012, this outlook indicates that we would have approximately $900 million available for deployment. Approximately, half of which we would intend to hold for capital flexibility at the parent. Overall, our capital position and outlook remains strong. And our capital deployment strategy and priorities remain unchanged. We will provide capital necessary to support the growth of our ongoing operations, as well as supporting our pension plan and Run-off Reinsurance business. We will pursue M&A activity with focus on acquiring capabilities and scale to further grow in our targeted areas in -- of focus, and after considering these first 2 items, we would return capital to shareholders primarily through share repurchase. I would remind you that we executed on each of these in 2011. So now to recap. Our full year 2011 consolidated results reflect the strength of our global diversified portfolio of businesses and effective execution of our focused growth strategy with solid growth in our targeted customer segments. We expect the momentum from our 2011 results will position us well for strong growth in 2012, highlighted by strong revenue growth, as well as attractive customer growth. Earnings growth off of a strong 2011, EPS growth with the opportunity for [indiscernible] deployment, positive impact from the HealthSpring acquisition and targeted strategic investments which provide sustained growth into the future. We will now turn it over to the operator for the Q&A portion of the call.