Understand any stock in simple English
Enter a ticker to learn what the company does and how it makes money.
Oscar Health sells health insurance plans to individuals, families, and small businesses, mostly through government-backed marketplaces.
Oscar Health is a health insurance company. It sells medical plans to people who buy coverage on their own, often through the government-run marketplaces created by the Affordable Care Act, and to small businesses that want to offer insurance to workers. Customers pay monthly premiums, and Oscar pays their medical bills. The company makes money when premiums and government subsidies bring in more than it spends on doctors, hospitals, and medicines. This gap is called the "medical loss ratio" — the share of premium dollars that goes to care. Lower is better for profit.
Most of Oscar's revenue comes from individual and family plans sold on the ACA marketplaces, with a smaller slice from small-group and Medicare Advantage plans. It also runs a technology platform called +Oscar that other insurers and providers can license. Think of it like a modern operating system for health insurance: the company leans on software, data, and a mobile app to handle sign-ups, claims, and care navigation cheaply, rather than relying on old call centers and paper forms. That tech focus is the main thing that sets it apart from giant legacy insurers.
Oscar was founded in 2012 by Mario Schlosser, Kevin Nazemi, and Joshua Kushner, with the idea that health insurance could feel more like a consumer app than a bureaucratic maze. It went public on the New York Stock Exchange in 2021. The business is highly sensitive to regulation and to how sick its members are, since a bad flu season or a costly batch of claims can wipe out margins. Growth has come from expanding into more states and products, and management has focused on reaching profitability by pricing plans carefully and using its tech to control costs. It does not pay a dividend; cash is mostly reinvested in growth and shoring up reserves that regulators require insurers to hold.
Saved answer · last researched 15 Oct 2026
see a list of the most recent 300 searches below: