The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services has proposed cuts to 340B drug payment rates as part of a broader effort to lower Medicare costs, while HRSA separately reported that 340B program sales hit $100 billion in calendar year 2025. The 340B program allows safety-net hospitals to buy drugs at steep discounts and bill Medicare at higher rates — a spread that has become a major revenue line for large hospital systems.
Who cashes in: Specialty pharmacy operators and PBMs that compete with hospital outpatient pharmacies stand to gain if hospital 340B economics weaken and patient volume shifts. CVS Health CVS — which just settled an FTC antitrust case over its Caremark PBM — and Cigna's Express Scripts (CI) benefit if hospitals lose pricing advantage in outpatient drug dispensing. Smaller independent pharmacies, which the FTC settlement explicitly aims to help, could see volume gains, but there are no clean pure-play public tickers there.
