This episode of The Motley Fool's Market Checkup drills down on the day's hottest headlines and plays a game of investing chicken with the world's biggest biotech. Market Checkup gives a full examination of the recent regulatory action around potential new generic threat to a big-time blockbuster drug and looks at a study questioning the benefits of robotic surgery.
In this video, health-care analysts David Williamson and Max Macaluso discuss the potential fallout if Congress successfully defunds the Affordable Care Act. It may come as a surprise that this potentially dangerous plan won't stop the law's implementation or help out businesses facing Obamacare's higher taxes.
What removing funding will do is negatively affect insurance companies such as Aetna and WellPoint that are counting on Medicaid expansion, subsidies, and the start of the state-based insurance exchanges. Regardless of whether Obamacare is funded, insurers will no longer be able to discriminate for pre-existing conditions, but if their access to a large, healthy pool of applicants is cut off, it could spell trouble.
However, insurers aren't the only stocks at risk. Watch and find out how your portfolio could be affected by what happens in Washington.
