Election 2024: Where To Put Your Money Ahead of the Vote

In this recurring series, The Fly recaps where the top analysts on Wall Street say to put your money ahead of November’s U.S. presidential election. In this edition, Vice President Kamala Harris proposes a new Medicare benefit for in-home eldercare and oil companies try to persuade former President Trump not to gut the IRA.

MEDICARE: Vice President Kamala Harris is proposing a new Medicare benefit for in-home eldercare that would cover long-term home care services, including health aides, allowing many seniors to get the support they need without going to a nursing home, The Wall Street Journal’s Andrew Restuccia and Jennifer Calfas report. The benefit, which would require congressional approval, will be paid for from the savings from a series of proposals Harris has made to lower prescription drug costs, according to Harris campaign officials. Medicare currently covers home health services such as care from nurses and physical therapy if seniors meet certain eligibility criteria, including being homebound, but does not cover 24-hour care at home. The Harris campaign says the added coverage would be funded in part by continued drug price negotiations with pharmaceutical companies. Publicly traded companies in the space include Cigna (CI), CVS Health (CVS), Humana (HUM), Centene (CNC), UnitedHealth (UNH), Alignment Healthcare (ALHC), Elevance Health (ELV), and Molina Healthcare (MOH).

BIG OIL URGES TRUMP NOT TO CUT IRA: Some oil companies are trying to persuade former President Donald Trump and his Republican allies not to slash provisions of the Inflation Reduction Act potentially worth billions to the oil industry, The Wall Street Journal’s Collin Eaton and Benoit Morenne report. In talks with Trump’s campaign and his allies in Congress, Exxon Mobil (XOM), Phillips 66 (PSX) and Occidental Petroleum (OXY) have praised the benefits of the IRA, with Occidental CEO Vicki Hollub saying tax credits propping up the company’s huge investments in technology to collect carbon directly from the air should be preserved, people familiar with the matter said. Some executives in the oil industry, which is largely pro-Trump, are worried that if re-elected, the former president would side with conservative lawmakers who want to gut the IRA. Exxon has also told the Trump campaign it wants to preserve portions of the IRA. It and Chevron (CVX) have promised to add over $30B combined into carbon capture, hydrogen, biofuels and other low-carbon technologies, most of which rely on tax credits in the IRA to be viable, and company officials at Phillips 66 have told members of Congress the IRA’s tax credits are important for its business, people familiar with the matter said. Other publicly traded companies in the space include ConocoPhillips (COP), Shell (SHEL), and TotalEnergies (TTE).

DRUG PRICES: The election in November may determine whether certain drug cost policies are expanded or continue to exist, Reed Abelson and Rebecca Robbins of The New York Times reported on Wednesday. Democratic nominee Vice President Kamala Harris has vowed to extend President Joe Biden’s policies to more drugs and more Americans, with plans to use savings from expanding negotiations to help pay for a new proposal to cover long-term care at home for people on Medicare. Republican nominee and former President Donald Trump has offered few specifics on what he would do on drug pricing. Last week, Trump reversed his position on a policy he proposed in his first term, which was to tie drug prices to what other wealthy countries pay. In a second term, he would face pressure from some Republicans to undo Biden’s Medicare negotiation program, though he once promoted the same thing. Industry observers say Harris is more likely to pose a greater threat to drugmakers’ profits, but aren’t ruling out the possibility that Trump could also be bad for their interests. Companies in the space include Bristol-Myers Squibb (BMY), Johnson & Johnson (JNJ), Eli Lilly (LLY), Merck (MRK), Pfizer (PFE), Sanofi (SNY), AstraZeneca (AZN), GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), Roche (RHHBY), and Novartis (NVS).

TRUTH+: Trump Media & Technology (DJT) announced Thursday that it has successfully launched an app for Android mobile devices to access the Truth+ TV streaming platform. Now available in the Google Play Store, “Truth+ offers TV programming to Android users focusing on news, entertainment, faith-based content, weather, documentaries, children’s content, and more, featuring both linear TV channels and Video on Demand,” the company said.

Shares of former President Trump’s media company hit their highest closing level in about six weeks on Thursday.