QualityDipStocks / Health Care · Medical Specialities
Centene CNC
Outside our quality screen, so we don’t track its dips. It’s 4% below its 52-week high.
Outside our quality screen, trading well below our fair value estimate.
- Fair value est.
- $191.88+180%
- Market Value
- forming
- Off 52-wk high
- −4%
- Risk vs market
- Lowbeta 0.32
5 bullish · 5 bearish See why
Key levels
Every level vs today’s $68.45
- 52-wk lowlowest close, 1 year$31.80−53.5%
- PriceFri Oct 30 close$68.45you are here
- 52-wk highhighest close, 1 year$71.24+4.1%
- Fair value est.base case$191.88+180.3%
Fair value estimate
How the range is computed
Ten-year free-cash-flow DCF. Same 10-year free-cash-flow model as the base: discount rate 9.5% ±1 point and growth 10.5% ±2 points. Bear = 10.5% and 8.5%; bull = 8.5% and 12.5% (both fade to 3%). A model estimate from public filings, not a forecast of where the price will go.
Price is below even the bear case.
Cyclical / peak cash flow — treat with care
What the price implies To be worth today’s price, CNC’s free cash flow would need to shrink about 8% a year for five years; our estimate uses 10%.
Risk vs market
How risk vs market is measured
One year of daily returns (Oct 30 to Oct 30, 252 sessions). Beta = how much CNC moved for each 1% move in the S&P 500 (SPY); 1.0 moves with the market. Volatility is the yearly standard deviation of daily returns. Past behavior, not a forecast.
Moves much less than the market, but its own price swings are 3.6× the S&P 500’s (it moves on its own news).
- Beta vs S&P 500
- 0.32
- Volatility
- 46% vs 13% SPY
- Correlation SPY
- 0.09
- Correlation QQQ
- 0.02
Bull vs bear
Rule-based from the data on this page, strongest first. Not advice.
Top bullish points 5 of 5
ValuationFree-cash-flow yield of 11.7% (price / FCF 8.6×): $3.9B of free cash in the last 12 months.
ValuationOur DCF fair value estimate is $191.88, 180% above the price (cyclical or peak cash flow, so treat with care).
Balance sheetNet cash of $8.0B: cash and short-term investments exceed debt (Sep 30, 2026).
GrowthSales grew 10% to $204B over the last 12 months vs the 12 months before (SEC filings).
Cash returnsFree cash flow grew 17% over the last 12 months vs the 12 months before.
Top bearish points 5 of 5
ProfitabilityReturn on equity fell 44 points in two fiscal years, to -33% in FY2025.
Balance sheetOperating income covers interest only 1.6× over the last 12 months.
ProfitabilityOperating margin narrowed to −3.9% in FY2025 from 1.9% in FY2023 (SEC filings).
ProfitabilityGross margin narrowed to 7.3% in FY2025 from 11.5% in FY2023 (SEC filings).
QualityDoesn’t pass our quality screen: ROE under 12% and ROIC under 10%.
Who’s talking about it
Notable investors, executives, analysts and public figures on Centene in the last 48 hours. Headlines as published, each linked. Their words, not ours.
No notable mentions in the last 48 hours. Checked Nov 1, 9:09 PM ET.
Compare with peers
Closest in size in Medical Specialities
All fundamentals
P/E 23.2 · FCF yield 11.7% · ROE 7%
Valuation
- P/E
- 23.2×Health Care median 29.2×
- Price / FCF
- 8.6×
- FCF yield
- 11.7%
- EV / EBITDA
- 11.5×
- Price / sales
- 0.17×
- Price / book
- 1.52×
- Market cap
- $33.8Bprice × diluted shares
- Enterprise value
- $25.8B
Growth
- Revenue, 12 months
- $204B
- Sales growth, 12 months
- +9.7%vs the 12 months before
- Sales growth, 3 yrs
- +10.5%/yrfrom FY2022
- Diluted EPS, 12 months
- $2.91
- EPS growth, last FY
- n/afewer than two years of diluted EPS
- Net income, 12 months
- $1.5B
- Net income growth
- n/anot reported in its SEC filings
Profitability
- Gross margin
- 7.9%
- Operating margin
- 0.5%
- Net margin
- 0.7%
- FCF margin
- 1.9%
- Return on equity
- 7%
- Return on invested capital
- 5%
Balance sheet
- Cash & short-term inv.
- $23.6B
- Total debt
- $15.5B
- Net cash
- $8.0B
- Debt / equity
- 0.70×
- Interest coverage
- 1.6×operating income / interest
Cash flow & returns
- Free cash flow, 12 months
- $3.9B
- FCF growth, 12 months
- +17%
- Dividend yield
- 0%
- Payout ratio
- n/anot reported in its SEC filings
- Buybacks, 12 months
- $59M0.2% of market cap
- Share count, 1 year
- +0.6%diluted shares vs a year ago
- Stock-based comp
- $236M
Trailing 12 months to Sep 30, 2026; balance sheet at Sep 30, 2026. From Centene’s SEC filings. Sparklines show up to six fiscal years. n/a means we don’t hold that number, with the reason. How each is computed.
Valuation details
DCF $191.88 · FCF value $198.30
Cyclical / peak cash flow — treat with care
Assumes 10.5% growth for 5 years (revenue grew 10.5% a year FY22–FY25), fading to 3%; 9.5% discount rate, 3% terminal growth. FCF base $7.98 a share (trailing 12 months to Sep 30, 2026), from the 10-Q filed Oct 27, 2026. Net cash $8.0B, not added.
Setup & signals
No setup armed
No setup armed, so there’s no trigger or stop to track yet. Reversal signal rules only run on companies that pass our quality screen.
Momentum & 52-week range
RSI 53 · 5 days −2.5%
The business
FCF $3.9B · Sales +2%
- Free cash flow, 12 months$3.9B
- Free-cash-flow yield11.6%
- Free-cash-flow margin2%
- Gross margin8%
- Operating margin1%
- Return on invested capital3%
- Return on equity7%
- Sales growth (latest quarter vs year-ago quarter)+2%
- Net debt / EBITDA−1.4×
Information only, not investment advice. Fair value estimates and talking points are rule-based model output from public data and can be wrong; stop levels are reference points, not orders. How every number is computed.
CNC is outside our quality screen
One text when a published rule fires on one of the 333 quality companies we track: the ticker, the price, the stop and a link to the numbers. Nothing else.