CLOV Q2 2026 - Preliminary Earnings Alert

Event: Quartr Q2 2026 event Retrieved: 2026-08-05T22:22:00Z Comparison mode: maximal Scorecard contract: v1 Source status: release=available | financials=earnings release only | transcript=available (not read for this preliminary stage)

Consensus scorecard

Reported results and guidance

Guidance (every full-year metric was raised):

• Scorecard recap: total revenues of $743.2m beat consensus by 2.0% and GAAP diluted EPS of $0.05 beat the $0.0386 estimate by 29.5%.
• Full-year guidance was raised on all five metrics, with GAAP net income moving to $20m-$35m from $0m-$20m and adjusted EBITDA to $70m-$85m from $50m-$70m.
• The company states the revenue guide represents 54% growth year over year at the midpoint and the gross profit guide 52% growth at the midpoint.
• CEO Andrew Toy framed the quarter as evidence that a wide-network, full-risk Medicare Advantage model can deliver outcomes, growth and profitability simultaneously, citing the AI-powered Clover Assistant platform.
• Interim CFO Clay Thornton attributed the raise to cohort economics improving year over year and said operating at full risk lets the company retain those economics.
• The company cites increasing confidence in its 2027 outlook, supported by cohort development, clinical engagement, and "the added flexibility of a 4.5 Star payment year."
• The company discontinued disclosure of Normalized Insurance Benefits Expense Ratio beginning in Q1 2026, stating management no longer uses it; the unadjusted Insurance BER continues to be presented.

Key bullish aspects

• Both scorecard metrics beat, and the swing in profitability is large: net income of $28.0m against a $(10.6)m loss a year ago, a $38.6m improvement, with the first half at $55.3m against $(11.9)m.
• Every full-year guidance metric was raised, including the GAAP net income floor moving from $0m to $20m — a raise on the measure that is hardest to manage.
• Medicare Advantage membership grew 48% year over year to 157,309, and average membership grew 48.7% to 156,840, so the revenue growth is volume-led rather than rate-led.
• The insurance benefits expense ratio improved 80 basis points to 87.6% while membership grew 48.7%, so the new cohorts are not diluting medical margin — the usual pattern when a plan grows this fast.
• Adjusted SG&A fell 220 basis points as a share of revenue to 15.1%, and salaries and benefits fell 11.7% in absolute dollars to $54.1m on 55.6% higher revenue.
• Consolidated gross profit rose 53.6% to $153.0m, roughly in line with the 55.6% revenue growth, so the gross margin held while scaling.
• Adjusted EBITDA rose 139.2% to $40.9m and adjusted net income rose 141.9% to $40.4m, both growing far faster than revenue.
• Operating cash flow of $133.1m over six months compares with $(10.9)m used a year ago, and cash and cash equivalents rose 154% to $198.8m.
• The balance sheet carries no debt; total stockholders' equity rose 21.9% to $376.3m and total cash, cash equivalents and investments reached $443.0m.
• Stock-based compensation fell 59% to $21.4m over six months from $52.6m, so the dilution burden is falling sharply even as share count rose 3.0%.
• The company points to a 4.5 Star payment year as adding flexibility to its 2027 outlook, which affects benchmark payment rates.

Key bearish aspects

• The raised full-year guidance still implies a materially weaker second half. Against $55.3m of first-half GAAP net income, the $20m-$35m full-year guide implies a second-half loss of $(35.3)m to $(20.3)m.
• The same is true of adjusted EBITDA: $81.2m was earned in the first half against a $70m-$85m full-year guide, implying second-half adjusted EBITDA of $(11.2)m to $3.8m.
• Consolidated gross profit of $312.5m in the first half against a $525m-$555m full-year guide implies $212.5m-$242.5m in the second half, a 22% to 32% step down from the first half.
• The revenue beat was only 2.0%, the smallest of the two scorecard metrics, and the full-year revenue guide implies second-half revenue of roughly $1.43bn-$1.51bn against $1.49bn in the first half — essentially flat sequentially despite 48% membership growth.
• G&A rose 45.0% to $70.3m in the quarter and 46.2% to $144.9m over six months, faster than the 13.3% growth in total SG&A would suggest, because salaries and benefits fell.
• Unpaid claims rose 63.7% to $250.9m, faster than the 56.1% growth in net medical claims incurred, and the $97.6m increase in unpaid claims supplied 73% of the six-month operating cash inflow.
• Accrued retrospective premiums rose 103% to $129.6m — receivables from risk-adjustment settlements that are estimated rather than billed, and a $65.7m six-month cash outflow.
• Adjusted SG&A rose 35.9% to $112.1m in absolute dollars, so the margin improvement comes from revenue outgrowing costs rather than costs falling.
• Diluted share count rose 7.2% to 545.4m as the company returned to profitability and dilutive equivalents re-entered the denominator; treasury stock rose 11.2% but no shares were repurchased in the period.
• Other income fell 30.7% to $5.4m, so all of the revenue growth and more came from premiums.
• The accumulated deficit remains $(2.23)bn against $376.3m of book equity.

Key uncertainties

• The release does not explain why raised full-year guidance implies a second-half loss against a profitable first half. Seasonality of Medicare Advantage medical costs is the usual reason, but the release does not say so, quantify it, or state prior-year seasonality.
• Whether the guidance is deliberately conservative or reflects a known second-half cost step-up cannot be determined from this document.
• The insurance benefits expense ratio is a non-GAAP measure and the company discontinued the Normalized Insurance BER this year, so the seasonally and risk-adjusted comparison it previously published is no longer available.
• Consolidated gross profit is defined as net income before nine separate expense lines; no forward reconciliation to GAAP is provided, and the company invokes the unreasonable-efforts exception for gross profit and adjusted EBITDA guidance.
• The $129.6m of accrued retrospective premiums and $73.1m of healthcare receivables are estimates subject to later settlement; the release gives no development or true-up history for them.
• Cohort economics are described as improving "as expected" but no cohort-level figures, retention rates, or year-of-enrollment margin data are given.
• The "4.5 Star payment year" is cited as supporting 2027 confidence but the release does not state the current Star rating, the payment-year mechanics, or the revenue effect.
• The Clover Assistant platform is credited with earlier intervention and better outcomes but no engagement, utilization, or measured outcome metric is disclosed.
• No segment breakdown beyond the Insurance segment appears on the pages read; "Lives under Clover Management" is a stated heading whose table was not preserved in extraction.
• Salaries and benefits fell 11.7% year over year in a quarter with 48.7% membership growth; the release does not explain the reduction, and six-month stock-based compensation fell 59%, which may account for part of it.
• The medical loss picture depends on unpaid-claims estimates that grew 63.7%; if claims develop adversely, both the BER and the second-half guide are exposed, and no prior-period development disclosure appears here.
• The 5:00 p.m. ET call had just begun at the time of this report and the transcript was not read for this preliminary stage; management's account of second-half seasonality, cohort economics, and the Star rating is not assessed here.

Market context

• API Ninjas snapshot: CLOV $4.14 on NASDAQ, volume 3,744,944, quote timestamped 2026-08-05T21:52:40Z, retrieved 2026-08-05T22:19:00Z. The release was published after the U.S. close on 2026-08-05; this is a single quote of unstated session basis captured after the close, not a measured reaction to the release.

Source limitations

• Every actual above comes from the Quartr Q2 2026 earnings release document (3667566). Quartr standardized financials for this event are not yet populated, and the slide deck (3969514) attached to this event was not read for this preliminary.
• API Ninjas supplied no actual or difference fields for this event, so each beat/miss is calculated locally as Quartr actual minus API Ninjas estimate. The API row carried no fiscal year or quarter, so the exact ticker-and-event-date match path was used.
• Year-over-year percentage changes and basis-point changes are calculated from the release's own columns; where the release prints a percentage itself, the calculated value agrees.
• Consolidated gross profit, adjusted SG&A, adjusted EBITDA, adjusted net income and the insurance benefits expense ratio are non-GAAP measures as defined by the company; their reconciliation tables were not read for this preliminary.
• The company reports no separate adjusted per-share figure, so the EPS scorecard row uses GAAP diluted EPS of $0.05.
• The condensed consolidated statements in this release are unaudited.
• The extracted statement tables interleave three-month and six-month columns; each figure above was assigned by matching it to the corresponding value in the company's own highlights table, and the totals foot.
• The insurance segment's net medical claims incurred of $615.4m differs from the consolidated $590.2m line in the statements of operations; both are reproduced as the release presents them, and the release does not bridge the two on the pages read.
• Implied second-half figures are calculated by subtracting the reported six-month actuals from the guided full-year ranges; the company does not present them.
• Membership counts, the guidance table, and the 4.5 Star reference are quoted from the release narrative.

Source links

• Quartr Q2 2026 earnings release
• Quartr release highlights and guidance page
• Quartr release key metrics and guidance table page
• Quartr release balance sheet page
• Quartr release statements of operations page
• Quartr release statements of cash flows page