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Health Thematic basket

Hospitals & Providers

The other side of the medical-cost-trend trade: the utilization that squeezes managed care is revenue here. Hospitals, surgery centers, behavioral and rehab, dialysis, home-based care, and the reference labs that price volume. Run it against managed-care — divergence between the two baskets IS the cost-trend signal. Policy risk cuts through both: site-neutral payment proposals and ACA subsidy expiry hit providers' payer mix directly.

5 stocks · S&P 500 universeEqual-weighted · monthly rebalance2026-10-16 · close
1 day-1.6%basket return
20 days+1.7%basket return
20 days vs S&P 500+1.6%relative return
Year to date+23.4%basket return

Performance

Follow the theme against the wider market.

Period
-2.1%+0.9%+4.0%+7.1%+10.1%2026-07-232026-10-16
Hospitals & ProvidersS&P 500

Series before each basket's creation date are a backtest of the membership as of creation; live tracking starts at creation.

Return1 day5 days20 days60 daysMTDYTD1 year
Basket-1.6%+2.8%+1.7%+7.3%+5.0%+23.4%+20.8%
vs S&P 500-0.5%+4.8%+1.6%+3.5%+4.8%+9.8%+4.7%

Risk statistics

Period · 1y

1y · 2025-10-16 – 2026-10-16 · 252 / 252 sessions

Sharpe ratio1.04Annualized · 0% risk-free rate
Sortino ratio1.71Annualized · 0% downside target
Historical volatility19.9%Annualized · daily log returns

Basket total returns · Annualized using 252 trading sessions · 0% risk-free rate and downside target. As of 2026-10-16 · close.

How these statistics are calculated

Risk methodology

Sharpe: average daily simple return divided by its sample standard deviation, multiplied by √252. The risk-free rate is assumed to be 0%; this is not a cash-adjusted ratio.

Sortino: average daily simple return divided by downside deviation, multiplied by √252. Downside deviation is the square root of the average squared shortfall below 0%, counting all sessions, including zeros for gains.

Historical volatility: √(252 × average squared daily log return), matching the Vol page’s realized-volatility convention. This differs from the sample standard deviation used in Sharpe.

Each period requires complete history and at least 5 sessions. MTD and YTD follow the calendar; 1y is 252 sessions. Missing data or an undefined ratio displays — with a reason. Short periods can produce unstable ratios; intraday snapshots include a partial session. History before this basket’s creation is backtested. If a new basket has no stored daily return series yet, estimates from its rounded published chart levels are marked ≈.

Full basket risk methodology →

Inside the basket · 5 stocks

Current members and the reasoning behind each inclusion. Returns are for individual holdings.

Why it’s includedAdded
HCAHCA HealthcareScale operator with the best payer mix and capital-return discipline-2.1%+1.7%+7.3%-1.2%2026-07-21
UHSUniversal Health ServicesAcute care plus the behavioral-health franchise-1.2%+4.4%+4.8%-14.8%2026-07-21
DVADaVitaDialysis duopoly half — a chronic-utilization annuity-1.0%+4.5%+1.9%+64.9%2026-07-21
LHLabCorpReference-lab volume duopoly (Labcorp)-2.2%+1.9%-0.9%+27.7%2026-07-21
DGXQuest DiagnosticsThe duopoly's other half (Quest)-1.7%+1.7%-4.3%+37.7%2026-07-21

How this basket is built

Equal-weighted; monthly rebalance, buy-and-hold between rebalances; dated membership changes reset the target weights.

Tracked since 2026-07-21. Membership decisions are documented below.

Read the methodology →

Reading the returns

Basket returns include dividends. “vs S&P 500” compares the basket’s compounded growth with the benchmark’s. Green means positive; red means negative.

Membership history & changes

Membership history

  • create

    Initial composition: 13 names — hospitals (HCA, UHS, THC, CYH), surgery centers and rehab (SGRY, EHC), behavioral (ACHC), dialysis (DVA), labs (LH, DGX), and post-acute/home-based care (ENSG, OPCH, ADUS). Built as the mirror of managed-care: utilization flows from payors to providers. No reference pinned — no listed pure-provider fund exists; IHF blends payors with providers and is already pinned to managed-care. Considered and excluded: AMED (UnitedHealth acquisition closed — delisted), SEM (absent from the current FW 3000 data), USPH and PNTG (sub-scale).

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