09:09 AM EDT, 10/15/2024 (MT Newswires) -- UnitedHealth Group ( UNH ) narrowed its full-year earnings outlook on Tuesday amid a higher-than-expected impact from business disruptions tied to a cybersecurity incident earlier in the year, while the health insurer reported third-quarter results above market estimates.

Adjusted earnings are now set to come in between $27.50 and $27.75 per share for 2024, reflecting a lower top end from the company's previous guidance of $28. The consensus on Capital IQ is for normalized EPS of $27.69. UnitedHealth's ( UNH ) stock declined 3.5% in premarket activity.

The guidance assumes an estimated per-share hit of $0.75 due to business disruptions arising from the cyber attack on the company's Change Healthcare unit in February, an increase of about $0.10 a share from the previous estimate, UnitedHealth ( UNH ) said in the Tuesday statement.

"We continue to work with customers to bring transaction volumes back to pre-event levels and to win new business with our now more modern, secure and capable offerings," Chief Financial Officer John Rex said in an earnings call with analysts, according to a Capital IQ transcript. "We expect to continue to build back the business to pre-attack levels over the course of 2025, and estimate next year's full year impact will be roughly half of the 2024 level."

For the three-month period ended Sept. 30, the health insurer reported adjusted EPS of $7.15, including $0.12 in business disruption impact but excluding $0.28 in direct response costs to the cyberattack. The latest result was higher than $6.56 reported in the prior-year quarter, and beat the Street's estimate of $7.03. Revenue climbed to $100.82 billion from $92.36 billion last year, topping analysts' $99.28 billion forecast.

The insurer's UnitedHealthcare segment, which provides health care benefits to people, including Medicare and Medicaid beneficiaries, generated revenue of $74.85 billion, up from $69.85 billion a year ago. Year-to-date, the number of people served domestically by the division grew by 2.4 million, the company said.

Revenue in the Optum business, which serves the global health care marketplace, advanced to $63.93 billion from $56.74 billion last year. Within the segment, Optum Health and Optum Rx logged revenue gains, while Optum Insight decreased to $4.93 billion from $4.98 billion last year.

Net margin declined to 6% from 6.3% in the 2023 quarter. UnitedHealth's ( UNH ) medical care ratio, which is used to measure medical costs as a percentage of premium revenue, rose to 85.2% from 82.3% last year. Total operating costs increased to $92.11 billion from $83.84 billion.

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