Sorry Oscar, There’s Just No Making this Stuff Simple

Oscar is still hemorrhaging money - $45 million in New York, Texas, and California in the 3rd Quarter of 2016 alone — following losses of $83 million in the first half of 2016 and about $105 million in the year before.

What I didn't realize until now was that Oscar founder Josh Kushner is the brother of Jared Kushner - Trump son-in-law and husband to Ivanka. Doubt any help is on the way from big brother or the President Elect, though...

Here's a link to a new Vanity Fair article with details:

Josh Kushner
 
From what I'm seeing, Oscar is now hemorrhaging customers faster than it's hemorrhaging money.

No one chooses their health insurance carrier based on which one has the best app, the funniest ads, or the slickest website.

Price. Network. Plan design. Stability. That's what people look for. I've never even heard a story of someone asking about an app, online management, etc. I can't even recall a story of a client asking about which one has the best service, it's assumed they all suck to deal with.

When a company is new, in the news for losing money, has limited plan designs that are the same as every other carrier, a price that's nothing special, and cuts their network in half so it's now the smallest one available, it's easy to understand why clients are now leaving as fast as they came in.
 
It will be interesting to see if Donald Trump upholds the 2015 Risk-Corridor payments to insurers. His Son-In-Law has a BIG stake in OSCAR.

Story: Trump
 
It will be interesting to see if Donald Trump upholds the 2015 Risk-Corridor payments to insurers. His Son-In-Law has a BIG stake in OSCAR.

Story: Trump

Article is inaccurate.

Son in law (Jared) has no stake, and is not a "former owner".

It's his brother Josh that co-founded Oscar.

https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/oscar#/entity has better data on Oscar's funding and ownership.

Notice Peter Thiel is an investor? He's the guy that donated $1.25M to Trump's campaign and is now on his Transition Team. Considering he's lead on Round C for $145M, he has a pretty big stake.

Good thing no one cares about conflicts of interest, or Trump would have a lot of problems.
 
Article is inaccurate.
Good thing no one cares about conflicts of interest, or Trump would have a lot of problems.

You're right Ray. Most Americans care about more substantive issues than what CNN thinks is important. Those idiots run hours and hours of Trump conflict-of-interest stories.
 
Latest Oscar losses update courtesy of Bloomberg (link to full article below).

Oscar Insurance Corp., the startup trying to reinvent medical insurance with its Obamacare-focused plans, lost more than $200 million on the products in 2016 as it heads into a year that may see the undoing of the health law.

The company offered plans in four states in 2016 and lost about $204.9 million on premium revenue of $425.9 million, according to filings. The loss widened from $121.7 million in 2015…

Oscar Chief Executive Officer Mario Schlosser remains optimistic for the insurer's prospects, saying that this year, the company's fourth in those markets, will show a "significant improvement." In New York, its largest market, the startup has moved to cut costs by working with a smaller set of hospitals and doctors, called a narrow network, a strategy already used in other regions. It also stopped selling in two areas, and boosted premiums significantly…

Oscar offers insurance in the ACA's individual market in the New York City area, San Francisco, Los Angeles and San Antonio, and exited the Dallas-Fort Worth area and New Jersey this year. Oscar has raised its premiums about 20% in New York, 24% in San Antonio and 12% in the Los Angeles area…

The company is also moving to sell health insurance to small businesses in New York and California. That'll help Oscar diversify away from the volatile individual market and eventually target large companies.


https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-02-28/losses-mount-for-obamacare-startup-oscar-as-law-s-repeal-looms
 
Oscar targeted the Millennial crowd. The same folks Obamacare complained about not attracting.

Maybe those young folks weren't so healthy after all.

How much taxpayer money did Oscar soak up? Or was it all private funding?
 
Re Brian's link: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/arti...obamacare-startup-oscar-as-law-s-repeal-looms

Most likely, Oscar's CEO remains "optimistic" because he's earning BIG BUCKS, and wants to continue.

Excerpt for Somarco:
""Oscar's backers include Kushner's (President Trump's Son-In-Law) Thrive Capital, as well as Fidelity Investments, Khosla Ventures and*Founders Fund, whose co-founder Peter Thiel is a Trump ally. The startup raised funds in early 2016 at a $2.7 billion valuation.""
 
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