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Quote this valuation with its source: Fair value, Potential value and the price at analysis.
FAQ
HCA — frequently asked questions
Is HCA Healthcare Inc. overvalued?
In our latest published analysis dated 2026-10-22, HCA looks modestly undervalued. The price recorded at analysis is USD 459 versus our fair value of USD 504; the high endpoint is presented separately as potential value of USD 659. That implies roughly 9.8% upside to fair value at that date.
Our latest published report, analyzed 2026-10-22, gives HCA a fair value of USD 504 and a potential value of USD 659. The conclusion is triangulated across multiple valuation models and weighted by reliability for HCA Healthcare Inc.'s archetype; it is a dated research output, not a live price.
Should I buy HCA now?
Our latest published rating for HCA, analyzed 2026-10-22, is Hold. HCA Healthcare Inc. looks modestly undervalued at the analysis-date price of USD 459 versus fair value of USD 504; potential value is USD 659. This is research for educational purposes, not personalized investment advice.
What are the biggest risks for HCA?
The dedicated bear-case section in our report analyzed 2026-10-22 documents HCA Healthcare Inc.'s material risks, evidence, thresholds, and thesis-invalidation conditions. Scenario-specific explanations remain in that section so the report does not repeat or decontextualize them elsewhere.
What is HCA's rating?
Our latest published rating for HCA, analyzed 2026-10-22, is Hold, with a published moat assessment of 7/10 (Narrow). It reflects our fair value of USD 504, the potential value of USD 659, and the price recorded at analysis (USD 459).
Bu rapor henüz çevrilmedi. Çeviri kuyruğu yetiştiğinde birkaç dakika sonra sayfayı yenileyin.
§1 Yönetici özetiEN
30 saniyelik yanıtHold
Fiyat ve değer karşılaştırması
Fiyat
$459.40
Adil değer
$504.46
Potansiyel değer
$658.79
Tarih
2026-10-21
Neden işe yarayabilir
Sustained population inflows into Texas and Florida driving commercial admission growth, coupled with continuous share buybacks funded by strong annual free cash flow that compound EPS growth well ahead of industry peers.
Görüşümüzü ne değiştirir
Persistent clinical wage inflation combined with health insurance exchange subsidy expiration driving uninsured patient mix shifts.
HCA Healthcare combines dominant acute-care market scale in high-growth Sunbelt metropolitan areas with exceptional operating cash flow conversion and relentless share buybacks, but the share price at $459.40 leaves modest upside relative to Fair value amid emerging surgical volume friction and payer mix headwinds.
HCA Healthcare exhibits the core financial traits of an established compounder, generating $75.60B in revenue and $11.97B in operating income in FY2025. The company's dense acute hospital networks across Texas, Florida, and broader Sunbelt markets provide structural pricing power and . reached $12.64B in FY2025, which after funding of $4.94B delivered $7.69B in . Management directs substantially all excess liquidity toward share retirements, reducing from 261.8M in FY2024 to 239.5M in FY2025 and 224.7M in 1H 2026, driving compound double-digit expansion ahead of underlying .
However, near-term operational challenges have surfaced in FY2026. In the second quarter, management lowered full-year pre-tax income expectations by $1.0B to $1.2B due to an adverse payer mix shift on the health insurance exchanges, which elevated uninsured patient volumes. Furthermore, surgical procedure volumes softened, with same-facility inpatient surgeries falling -2.3% and outpatient surgeries declining -3.4%, reflecting ongoing procedural migration toward independent ambulatory centers. Working capital demands also escalated, driving a $1.42B accounts receivable drag in the first six months of 2026 and reducing 6M operating cash flow to $4.35B compared to $5.86B in 6M 2025. In addition, total debt expanded to $51.55B as of October 2026, with stockholders' equity at -$6.03B, increasing sensitivity to elevated refinancing yields.2,5
Valuation synthesis balances HCA's powerful cash compounding engine against these margin and balance sheet constraints. At the analysis price of $459.40, shares offer 9.8% upside to Fair value of $504.46. While fundamental earnings models reflect durable per-share cash generation, the present margin of safety is insufficient to warrant an aggressive accumulation stance given near-term policy uncertainties and hospital debt burdens, supporting a disciplined Hold rating.
Dominant Local Market Clustering in High-Growth Sunbelt MSAs
HCA's concentrated hospital networks and ambulatory facilities across Texas, Florida, and other Sunbelt states provide scale advantages and resilient acute patient demand.
Operating cash flow of $12.64B and free cash flow of $7.69B in FY2025 demonstrate exceptional conversion supported by HealthTrust procurement efficiencies.4,5
Relentless Per-Share Capital Compounding via Buybacks
Aggressive share repurchases compound EPS growth at double digits, reducing diluted share count at an annual rate of 2.6% to 3.0%.5
Kurum tavsiyesi
Hold. HCA is an exceptional compounder with enduring competitive advantages, but with shares trading at $459.40 against a Fair value of $504.46 (9.8% implied upside), the valuation margin of safety is narrow given operational mix headwinds and elevated balance sheet debt.
Şirkete genel bakış
HCA Healthcare, Inc. is the largest non-governmental provider of acute healthcare services in the United States. As of June 30, 2026, the company operated 190 hospitals and approximately 2,600 ambulatory sites of care—including 118 freestanding outpatient surgery centers, freestanding emergency rooms, urgent care centers, and physician clinics—located across 19 states and the United Kingdom. HCA organizes its hospital operations into three primary operating divisions: the American Group ($26.45B in FY2025 revenue), the Atlantic Group ($24.71B in FY2025 revenue), and the National Group ($21.28B in FY2025 revenue).
The company generates patient service revenue through inpatient admissions, emergency care, and outpatient surgical services. Patient revenue is funded through a diversified payer mix comprising commercial health insurance plans, Medicare, Medicaid, and self-pay individuals. HCA leverages network clustering across high-growth Sunbelt metropolitan statistical areas, supported by centralized group purchasing through its HealthTrust GPO subsidiary and proprietary clinical workforce staffing initiatives.
§2 Olumsuz senaryoEN
A compounded stress scenario evaluates simultaneous labor inflation, payer mix deterioration from health insurance exchange subsidy rollbacks, and elevated capital costs across HCA's $51.55B debt structure. In FY2026, management already recognized a $1.0B to $1.2B pre-tax headwind from uninsured volume shifts following exchange coverage losses. If specialized nursing wage pressures elevate salaries and benefits back toward 48% of revenue while elective inpatient surgeries decline by 3% annually due to ambulatory center disintermediation, operating margins would compress from the modeled 16.0% toward 13.0%, removing roughly $2.3B in annual operating income. Concurrently, refinancing maturing senior debt at prevailing yields (with pre-tax debt costs at 6.15% and risk-free rates at 5.15%) would elevate annual interest expense toward $2.8B, depressing free cash flow well below $5.0B. Under this confluence of shocks, discretionary share repurchases would be halted to preserve debt covenants, eliminating the per-share compounding engine that historical equity returns have relied upon.
Payer mix shift toward uninsured patients following exchange policy adjustments
Clinical wage inflation and nursing shortages compressing operating margins
Bu tezin bozulabileceği yollar
Severe clinical wage inflation and exchange subsidy expiration compress operating margins by 300 bps.
HCA guided FY2026 pre-tax income down by $1.0B to $1.2B due to health insurance exchange enrollment losses increasing uninsured patient volumes. Operating margin historically compressed to 13.61% in FY2020 during nursing shortages. A drop below 13.0% vs modeled 16.0% eliminates ~$2.3B in operating income.2
FV impact
-7.1%
İzlenecek erken uyarı sinyalleri
Yatırım tezimizi zayıflatacak beş gelişme.
01
Same-facility inpatient and outpatient surgical case growth
Accelerated procedural migration to independent ambulatory surgery centers erodes high-acuity commercial surgical margin contributions.
Güncel:-2.3% inpatient / -3.4% outpatient in Q2 2026
Şu durumda uyarSustained annual surgical volume decline exceeding -3.0%
HCA Healthcare possesses a narrow economic moat grounded in structural cost advantages and efficient scale across concentrated regional hospital clusters. The company operates 190 acute care hospitals and approximately 2,600 ambulatory sites of care distributed primarily across high-growth Sunbelt metropolitan statistical areas. By establishing comprehensive 'hub-and-spoke' healthcare delivery systems—linking tertiary referral hospitals with freestanding emergency rooms, urgent care centers, and diagnostic facilities—HCA captures patient volume across the care continuum and establishes indispensable bargaining power with commercial health insurance plans.
A primary source of HCA's structural moat is procurement efficiency achieved through HealthTrust GPO, its majority-owned group purchasing organization. HealthTrust negotiates supply contracts across pharmaceutical, implant, and medical equipment categories for HCA and external member health systems. This purchasing leverage contained supply costs to 14.3% of revenue in Q2 2026 and supported a consolidated FY2025 operating margin of 15.8%, well above the acute care hospital peer benchmark of 12.9%. In addition, proprietary nurse scheduling and clinical staffing models, supplemented by the Galen College of Nursing partnership, mitigate structural wage inflation relative to fragmented competitors.
The economic moat is bounded from a Wide to a Narrow designation by technological disintermediation and payer reimbursement dynamics. High-margin surgical procedures face continuous migration to independent ambulatory surgical centers, evidenced by Q2 2026 same-facility inpatient surgeries contracting -2.3% and outpatient surgeries declining -3.4%. Furthermore, commercial payers aggressively utilize prior authorizations and claim denials to curb hospital reimbursement, while exposure to government programs (Medicare and Medicaid) subjects margins to legislative and fiscal pressures. These factors constrain pricing power and limit moat durability to a 10-year explicit horizon.
Ekonomik kâr
HCA delivers industry-leading profitability with FY2025 operating income of $11.97B on $75.60B in revenue (15.83% operating margin), outperforming the hospital industry benchmark operating margin of 12.9% and peer UHS at 11.14%. This spread over the estimated 7.83% WACC confirms substantial economic rent generation across its acute care network.1,2,5
7/ 10
Narrow
Sources of advantage
01Cost Advantage (HealthTrust GPO and Centralized Procurement Scale) — Centralized supply chain purchasing through HealthTrust GPO enables HCA to procure pharmaceuticals, implants, and medical supplies at volume discounts unavailable to smaller hospital systems, keeping supplies expense at 14.3% of revenue in Q2 2026 and supporting an operating margin of 15.8% compared to the 12.9% industry average.Wide
02Efficient Scale & Local Market Concentration (Sunbelt Acute Care Clusters) — HCA operates 190 hospitals and approximately 2,600 ambulatory sites of care, creating dense metropolitan healthcare networks across Texas, Florida, and other Sunbelt states. This network clustering establishes preferred provider status with commercial payers and drives same-facility equivalent admissions up 2.7% and same-facility per equivalent admission up 6.4% in Q2 2026.
Kalkana yönelik bilinen tehditler
Tehdit
Şiddet
Zaman çizelgesi
Hafifletme
Procedural disintermediation and surgical case migration to independent ambulatory surgery centers
high
12-24 months
Accelerating internal investments in proprietary freestanding outpatient surgery centers (operating 118 centers as of Q2 2026) and ambulatory care networks to capture migrating procedural volume within the HCA system.
Commercial health plan reimbursement friction, claim denials, and narrow network steerage
The highlighted cell is Fair value when every assumption sits at its base level ($504.46). Each row and column shows what Fair value becomes when one assumption moves.
Free cash flow to the firm stays positive in the first projected year at $8.3B after modeled reinvestment of $1.5B, with terminal value at 82.7% of enterprise value. A sudden drop in free cash flow is not projected unless capital spending relative to revenue, reinvestment, or gross margin resets materially.
Maintain Hold; Assess whether revenue expansion reflects sustainable commercial surgical market share gains or temporary supplemental payment timing before altering capital deployment.
Tetikleyici: Consolidated revenue and diluted earnings per share exceeding the upper boundary of annual management guidance, driven by accelerating same-facility admissions and surgical volume recovery alongside stable labor expense ratios.
An earnings beat driven by operational acuity gains and resilient commercial pricing would reinforce the durability of earnings power, yet valuation would remain balanced relative to Fair value $504.46 from the share price $459.40.
Beklenti içi
Maintain Hold; Maintain current portfolio weighting while monitoring accounts receivable collections and payer reimbursement dispute resolutions at subsequent releases.
Tetikleyici: Consolidated revenue and diluted earnings per share tracking within the guided annual range, with same-facility admission growth matching historical rates and salary expense stable as a percentage of revenue.
In-line financial performance confirms the steady-state compounding thesis, indicating that HealthTrust procurement scale and share retirements are offsetting exchange payer mix headwinds as anticipated.
Altında kaldı
Downgrade the rating; Re-examine operational cash flow conversion and reduce exposure if operating margins fall toward established danger thresholds.
Tetikleyici: Consolidated revenue or earnings per share falling below the lower boundary of annual management guidance due to severe exchange enrollment attrition, escalating clinical staffing wages, or worsening surgical volume contraction.
A guidance cut or earnings miss driven by structural labor wage inflation and uncompensated emergency care would impair operating cash flow conversion and restrict share repurchase capacity.
Kazanç kalitesi
Operating earnings quality reflects strong structural conversion over multi-year cycles, backed by disciplined centralized procurement and scale advantages. However, working capital friction emerged during the first half of the fiscal year, where operating cash flow declined year-over-year due to a substantial build in patient accounts receivable. While depreciation and amortization remain well covered by operating cash flow, investors should monitor cash collection velocity and payer reimbursement dispute resolution to ensure normalized conversion resumes.
Tahminlerin yönü
Consensus estimate momentum has tilted downward following management guidance revisions in the second quarter. The downward revision was prompted by an unfavorable payer mix shift on the health insurance exchanges, which increased uninsured patient volumes and uncompensated care, alongside soft surgical procedural demand. While emergency room visits and broad equivalent admissions expanded, lower guided pre-tax income for FY2026 prompted analysts to moderate near-term earnings expectations.
Açıklama öncesi izlenecek metrikler
01
Metrik:
Same-Facility Surgical Case Volumes
MevcutRecent quarterly reports show surgical case volumes contracting across both inpatient and outpatient settings.
Neden önemli
Surgical procedures generate the highest contribution margins per encounter; sustained case attrition indicates competitive procedural migration to ambulatory surgery centers.
02
Metrik:
Salaries and Benefits Expense as a Percentage of Revenue
MevcutLabor cost ratios showed year-over-year improvement in the most recent quarter, but regional nursing shortages remain an ongoing operating challenge.
Cash generation is robust but showed working capital friction in 1H 2026. In FY2025, operating cash flow was $12.64B and free cash flow was $7.69B after deducting $4.94B in capital expenditures, representing an operating cash flow to net income conversion ratio of 1.86x ($12.64B vs $6.78B). For the six months ended June 30, 2026, cash flow from operations dropped 25.8% year-over-year to $4.35B compared to $5.86B in 6M 2025, driven by a $1.42B working capital drag in accounts receivable. Cash capex for 1H 2026 reached $2.35B, leaving first-half free cash flow at roughly $2.0B. Management's unchanged FY2026 CapEx guide of $5.0B-$5.5B indicates that full-year free cash flow will normalize near $6.5B-$7.0B as second-half receivables collections normalize.
HCA's return on capital profile remains durable. FY2025 operating income of $11.97B on $75.60B in revenue yielded a 15.83% operating margin, outperforming acute care peers like UHS (11.14% operating margin). While negative book equity of -$6.03B (resulting from cumulative share repurchases) distorts conventional ROE, enterprise return on invested capital comfortably exceeds the estimated cost of capital (WACC of 7.83%). In 1H 2026, annualized operating performance remained stable, with salaries and benefits improving to 41.0% of revenue in Q2 2026, preserving the economic profit spread.
Consolidated operating margins of 15.8%-16.0% substantially exceed the estimated 7.83% and 9.34% , confirming that HCA's acute healthcare network generates meaningful economic value over its capital cost.
Son gelir$75,6 MrGelir CAGR +%6,9
Faaliyet marjı%15,810 mali dönem
Son serbest nakit akışı$7,7 MrFY2025
Net borç$43,2 MrFY2025
Gelir tablosu dökümüİşletme ölçeğinin raporlanan kâra nasıl dönüştüğü.
StockMarketAgent.AI
Gelir$75,6 MrSatışların maliyeti−$44,2 MrBrüt kâr$31,4 MrFaaliyet giderleri−$19,4 MrFaaliyet kârı$12 MrFaaliyet dışı kalemler ve vergiler−$5,2 MrNet kâr$6,8 Mr
Finansal geçmiş verileri
Gelir
$75.600.000.000
Satışların maliyeti
$44.226.000.000
Brüt kâr
$31.374.000.000
Faaliyet giderleri
$19.409.000.000
Faaliyet kârı
$11.965.000.000
Faaliyet dışı kalemler ve vergiler
-$5.181.000.000
Net kâr
$6.784.000.000
Bilanço özetiRaporlanan varlıkların seçili dönemde nasıl tutulduğu ve finanse edildiği.
HCA Healthcare Inc. (HCA) trades at 13.9x forward earnings against a peer median of 12.4x. Its EV/EBITDA of 9.7x compares with a peer median of 9.8x. The comparison uses 4 peers: DaVita Inc., Universal Health Services Inc., Elevance Health Inc. and Stryker Corporation, as of 2026-10-21 to 2026-10-22.
§10 Sektör ve döngüEN
Döngü aşaması
Expansion
Industry capex-to-revenue benchmarks stand at 3.0% and capex-to-depreciation at 1.41x. HCA deployed $4.94B in capital expenditures in FY2025 against depreciation and amortization of $3.52B (capex/depreciation of 1.40x), and guided FY2026 capex to $5.0B-$5.5B against D&A of $3.75B-$3.80B.5
Yükseliş döngüsü
An acute healthcare upcycle is characterized by accelerating commercial inpatient surgical admissions, favorable population migration into Sunbelt networks, commercial payer rate increases exceeding medical inflation, and successful clinical workforce stabilization. In this phase, operating margins expand toward 16.5%-17.0%, generating robust operating cash flows that fully fund facility expansions while driving aggressive share buybacks.
Düşüş döngüsü
A downcycle in hospital operations is driven by commercial payer contract resistance, rising uncompensated care from Medicaid and exchange disenrollment, persistent clinical nurse wage inflation, and aggressive surgical steerage toward non-hospital outpatient surgery centers. In this environment, acute hospital operating margins compress toward 12.0%-13.0%, while elevated capital expenditures and debt service restrict equity returns.
Uzun vadeli eğilimler
Eğilim
Etki
Not
Sunbelt demographic expansion and aging population
positive
Ongoing population migration into Texas, Florida, and broader Sunbelt metropolitan areas expands total healthcare demand and supports steady commercial admission volumes.
Surgical case migration to outpatient ambulatory settings
negative
Advances in minimally invasive techniques and health plan financial steerage continue to shift elective surgical cases out of inpatient hospitals to freestanding surgery centers.
Konumlandırma
HCA holds the premier market position among acute hospital operators, with roughly 190 hospitals and 2,600 care sites concentrated in advantageous Sunbelt demographics. Its centralized management model, proprietary staffing programs, and HealthTrust GPO purchasing power enable it to operate at margins 300 bps above the hospital industry average, ensuring superior financial resilience across cyclical shifts in health policy and labor availability.
§11 Pozisyon yönetimiEN
Pozisyon büyüklüğü
2-3%
Hold rating, narrow economic moat, and modest 9.81% implied upside support a standard allocation weight. Elevated balance sheet debt ($51.55B) and health insurance exchange policy uncertainty warrant disciplined sizing until surgical volume growth re-accelerates.2
Risk
Maintain strict risk control by limiting single-name exposure to the recommended portfolio weighting band. Track quarterly surgical volume metrics and bad debt expense to identify early deterioration in commercial payer mix. In the event of federal health policy changes that eliminate state directed Medicaid payment programs or further curtail exchange subsidies, reduce portfolio allocation toward the lower end of the recommended band.
Giriş dilimleri
Seviye
Eylem
Neden
Disciplined pullback level
Initial tranche on market pullbacks reflecting a disciplined discount to Fair value
Aligns with conservative discounted consensus valuation and establishes an initial position with an improved margin of safety.
HCA's structural share retirement cadence compounds EPS growth above top-line expansion, making it a compelling long-term compounder, but pricing near $459.40 leaves little margin of safety against near-term policy and labor risks.5
Value Investor
Hold
Trading at a forward P/E of 13.85x, HCA trades at a substantial premium to acute care peer UHS (forward P/E of 7.73x). Value investors should wait for deeper market pullbacks before committing new capital.2,3
HCA Healthcare is a premier acute healthcare compounder with strong local market positions in high-growth Sunbelt states, exceptional operating cash flow generation, and an aggressive share repurchase program. However, with the stock trading at $459.40 against a Fair value of $504.46 (9.8% implied upside), the valuation margin of safety is narrow given emerging surgical case volume headwinds, exchange payer mix shifts, and an elevated debt load.2
Investors should hold existing allocations while awaiting more attractive valuation entry points or concrete operational evidence that surgical volumes have stabilized and accounts receivable conversion has normalized.
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Sources
The records this analysis drew on, as they stood when it was run.
Market and peer researchData as of 2026-10-21 · Published 2026-10-21 · Provider-adjusted · cited for 1 figureCited in Olumsuz senaryo, Yatırımcı bakış açıları
Not every cited input appears here: internal calculations and intermediate model outputs have no external record, and some citations could not be matched to one.
The downside path models persistent operational headwinds, where health insurance exchange enrollment losses increase uncompensated emergency care encounters and clinical wage inflation outpaces commercial reimbursement updates. Concurrently, procedural migration to independent ambulatory surgical venues erodes inpatient acuity, while elevated debt refinancing burdens absorb operating cash and constrain share buybacks.
Operating margin 3 points lower throughout
Trigger
Within 12 months
Debt refinancing shock across $51.55B debt load expands cost of capital by 200 bps.
Total debt stands at $51.55B as of October 2026 ($44.29B in FY2025) with stockholders' equity at -$6.03B. On July 29, 2026, HCA doubled commercial paper authorization to $8.0B. Current WACC is 7.83% based on pre-tax cost of debt of 6.15% and risk-free rate of 5.15%. A 200 bps increase in capital costs to 9.83% sharply reduces enterprise valuation.1,2,5
The base model assumes an exit P/E of 13.5x, near current forward P/E of 13.85x. Peer hospital operator UHS trades at a forward P/E of 7.73x and trailing P/E of 7.57x. A 20% contraction from 13.5x to 10.8x reflects multiple compression toward peer benchmarks.2,3
FV impact
-4.3%
Terminal multiple 20% lower
Trigger
Within 24 months
Persistent surgical case erosion and Medicaid disenrollment drag 5-year revenue growth into negative territory.
In Q2 2026, same-facility inpatient surgeries declined -2.3% and outpatient surgeries declined -3.4%. Accelerated procedural migration to ambulatory surgery centers combined with commercial payer steerage that reduces top-line CAGR by 500 bps from the modeled 4.0% path erodes hospital operating leverage.
FV impact
-8.9%
Revenue and EPS growth 5 points lower for five years
Trigger
Within 36 months
Severe clinical wage inflation and hospital nursing shortages driving reliance on premium contract agency staffing.
Güncel:41.0% in Q2 2026 and 42.1% in 6M 2026
Şu durumda uyarSalaries, wages, and benefits exceeding 48.0% of revenue for two consecutive quarters
Essential network positioning and broad tertiary clinical capabilities prevent commercial payers from excluding HCA facilities from regional provider networks.
Clinical labor shortages and wage inflation across acute hospital nursing staff
medium
6-18 months
Internal clinical labor development through Galen College of Nursing and proprietary internal nurse float pools reduce premium third-party contract labor dependency.
Discounted forecast-period cash flows ($166) plus discounted terminal value ($789) minus signed per current share ($195) equals the $760 lens value shown above. Negative net debt is , so subtracting it raises value.
MevcutOperating cash generation contracted in the first half of the year due to an increase in accounts receivable balances.
Neden önemli
Cash conversion powers the core compounding engine; working capital delays or payer claim denials reduce cash generation available for share repurchases.
04
Metrik:
Commercial Paper Utilization and Interest Burden
MevcutManagement expanded the commercial paper program authorization to enhance short-term borrowing liquidity amid elevated total debt balances.
Health Insurance Exchange Payer Mix and Uncompensated Care
MevcutManagement revised downward its annual pre-tax outlook to reflect an unfavorable payer mix shift from exchange policy transitions.
Neden önemli
Policy adjustments and subsidy expirations shift covered exchange enrollees into uninsured status, driving uncompensated care and lowering net revenue per admission.
HCA executes an aggressive, share-repurchase-centric capital allocation strategy. In FY2025, the company deployed $10.07B to repurchase common stock, reducing diluted shares from 261.8M to 239.5M. In the first six months of 2026, HCA allocated another $3.64B to share buybacks, driving diluted share count down 8.5% year-over-year to 224.7M shares. Cash dividends remain modest at $0.78 per share quarterly ($354M paid in 1H 2026). Capital expenditures consumed $4.94B in FY2025 and are guided at $5.0B-$5.5B in FY2026. However, buybacks have been partially debt-financed, expanding total debt to $51.55B as of October 2026 ($44.29B in FY2025) and leaving stockholders' equity in a deficit of -$6.03B. On July 29, 2026, HCA increased its commercial paper authorization from $4.0B to $8.0B to support ongoing short-term liquidity needs.
Working capital friction and commercial payer reimbursement adjudication delays temporarily suppress cash conversion, requiring monitoring of receivables collections.
Total debt reached $51.55B as of October 2026 ($44.29B at FY2025 end), with stockholders' equity at -$6.03B and FY2026 guided interest expense at $2.41B-$2.47B.
A high debt load elevates sensitivity to debt refinancing costs (pre-tax debt cost at 6.15%), restricting valuation multiple expansion.
Stryker CorporationSYK
Fiyat / gerçeğe uygun değer
Gerçeğe uygun değer$313,18Report-date price$297,6
Değerlendirme tarihi
Ekonomik hendekNarrow
Yatırım puan kartı75 / 100
Marj
HCA
HCA Healthcare Inc.
$101.9B
13.9x
1.3x
9.7x
—
—
DVA
DaVita Inc.
$11.3B
10.2x
0.8x
9.1x
88.5%
16.1%
UHS
Universal Health Services Inc.
$10.9B
7.7x
0.6x
6.0x
20.9%
11.1%
ELV
Elevance Health Inc.
$94.1B
14.6x
0.5x
10.6x
11.1%
4.6%
SYK
Stryker Corporation
$114.2B
17.9x
4.4x
17.1x
16.5%
27.0%
Health insurance exchange enrollment losses and payer mix deterioration
negative
Administrative changes and the expiration of enhanced premium tax credits have resulted in an estimated $1.0B to $1.2B pre-tax income headwind in FY2026 due to uninsured volume growth.
Technology-enabled hospital operations and staffing automation
positive
Adoption of proprietary digital scheduling, telemedicine, and automated clinical workflows enhances nurse productivity and reduces reliance on premium contract agency labor.
Downgrade rating to Sell and reduce Fair value to reflect structural labor cost inflation.
