Arkansas: *Final* avg. unsubsidized 2024 #ACA rate changes: +4.1%

Arkansas is a problematic state for many reasons, but I have to give their insurance dept. website high praise for posting their annual rate filings in a clear, simple & comprehensive fashion (which is to say, not only do they post the avg. premium changes for each carrier, they also post the number of covered lives for each, which is often difficult for me to dig up). Better yet, they also include direct links to the filing summaries and include the SERFF tracking number for each in case I need to look up more detailed info.

Anyway, there's nothing terribly noteworthy in the 2024 filings. Insurance carriers sought an average 5.0% rate hike on the individual market and 5.5% for small group plans; these were shaved down slightly by state regulators for overall weighted average increases of 4.1% and 5.4% respectively.

USAble HMO is launching a new line of HMO insurance products in the state next year (called "Octave" I believe) but otherwise it looks pretty calm.

It's worth noting that only around 100,000 of Arkansas' individual market policies are on-exchange QHPs; they also have roughly 342,000 residents enrolled in their "Private Medicaid option" plans...but I can't tell whether those are included in the ~390K figure below, since if they are, that would put the state's total individual market at over 442,000 while if they aren't, it would mean 3/4 of their individual market enrollment remains off-exchange, which also doesn't make much sense. Huh.