should a company like unitedhealth group even have a medicare business? when you get in bed with medicare parts a or b or d, and i was on the phone all day trying to understand it because medicare itself is complicated. should unitedhealth have a medicare business, as you're noting, medicare has four different parts. the a is for the hospital, the b is the doctor's office, the d is for the drugs. and this is part c, which is the ability to provide care through a capitated system. and i believe it's a good way to go. the problem is that rather than paying the insurance company this prepayment, which means that all they can do is require prior authorization and other interventional ways to lower utilization, you should be paying it, as far as i'm concerned, at the clinician level, the doctors in the hospitals, because they're the ones who can change your health and keep you healthier. and i think if we were to move in that direction and united healthcare will required or did it voluntarily to pay the money directly to the people providing the care, i think

finally, another company from health care space, unitedhealth group is moving down today after the fda said -- sorry, the department of justice said he launched an investigation potentially saying patient diagnosis forced higher payments from the medicare program. that is why the stock is down sharply today. vonnie: we will look at that stock now. natalia, thank you for the details on the unitedhealth news. we are joined by john tolley. insurers got billions of payments and that is the contingent in the system. if it is true, how did it happen? john: just to be clear, the news came from the wall street journal. the department of justice has not commented. the issue is that these insurers contract with united states government to take care of people on medicare and private medicare advantage plans. how much they get paid in the plans depends on how severely ill the people they enroll are. the question being raised is whether companies are inflating the diagnoses, the illnesses they report to the government for payment in a way that crosses a line that inflates their payments from the go

meantime the unitedhealth group is facing a federal fraud investigation.ording to the "wall street journal," the department of justice is looking into the company's medicare billing practices, probing how the company records diagnoses that lead to extra payments for its medicare advantage plans. unitedhealth says it is unaware of the investigation, calling the report fraudulent. >>> taking a live look at the state capitol, where a bay area lawmaker is attempting to hold health insurance companies accountable for wrongly denied claims. a bill from state senator scott wiener would require insurance companies to report denials to the state if too many of those cases are overturned on appeal, the company would be hit with fines. >>> coming up next at 5:00, new developments in the menendez brothers' push for a new trial, today's announcement from the l.a. county district attorney. >> with respect to law enforcement, we have spoken with every menendez family member that wanted to speak with us. so we've done the hard work. >>> we'll meet a new year and a new adv

apple, ibm, unitedhealth group is up and nike is up as well.rs. ecolabs is on there, phillips 66, dupont, coca-cola and since halt inty -- is that financial? i guess since matty financial, that that's what it was. and the nasdaq winners, global groundings, is that it? if. >> foundries. david: okay. my eyes are not as good as they used to be -- [laughter] >> on semi, mongo db and apple. david: and the 10-year treasury, the yield is up 4.2 basis points to 4.536%. that's the 10-year. check in on gold. as we mentioned, it's down just by a tick, down about $6. still well over $2900 per ounce. and bitcoin is down, again, not by a9 lot from their standards, it's down to $96,946. taking a look at oil, it's up a little bit, up about 88 cents to $73.20 the a barrel, and nat gas is up about 3%. big jump for nat gas. the average price, by the way, for a gallon of regular is now $3.14. but if you live in california, sorry to say it is the $4.66. what a difference. >>> coming up, senate republicans are pushing two separate bills to get trump's agenda passed,

yahaira: unitedhealth group shares are tumbling nearly 10% amid reports that the justice department launched its billing practices. the journal reporting that the doj is looking into the united health diagnosing practices after claims that medicare paid the company billions of dollars for questionable diagnoses. president trump met with tim cook at the white house yesterday. cook is among the tech leaders trying to foster a closer relationship with trump since his reelection. apple is caught in the middle of an escalating trade fight between the u.s. and china at a time that it is seeking to revive sluggish iphone sales. amazon mgm studios gained creative control over the james bond franchise forming a joint venture with longtime custodians, ending the family control over the franchise paving the way for amazon to offer more james bond content. your bloomberg brief. jonathan: in the 1960's, he said, do you know how many times i've seen that online? that is what people want he said in the 1960's. dani: i can't think about him without the cgi mustache situation. if amazon owns it, they need a

felt the unitedhealth is every bit as powerful as the government because they are strong, sprawling and ready to fight. and the government has historically not been able to take on this group. they haven't been to take on the middlemen either. look, i mean, we have we have strong corporations in our country, and unitedhealth is not going to have to in the end. i'm telling you that i do not think this is going to be significant to their earnings. that's what i'm saying, david. >> one question will be. whether jim's right from a legal standpoint or a political standpoint, given some of the winds that have shifted regarding some of these names. >> yeah, i mean. this is this. >> is fascinating. and. >> you know, obviously unh. >> and any. >> number of the other. insurers have been. >> sort of in focus in. >> part, obviously, we all remember the tragic murder of unitedhealthcare ceo. >> not that. >> long. >> ago, but. >> of course, it did. >> sort of increase the overall discussion around medical care. >> in the. >> country, what is covered and what isn't. it's important to point out here, there's sort of two different lines of criticism, so to speak. there was the great wall.