CVS HEALTH Corp (CVS) September 2026 Conference Transcript

All right. Thank you, everyone, for being with us today. Really pleased to have CVS here as our next speaker at the conference. As I'm sure, again, all of you know, CVS operates a diversified healthcare services business focused on health plan and pharmacy service assets largely. With us from the company, Brian Newman, CFO, Steve Nelson, President of Aetna, and Larry McGrath, Chief Strategy Officer. You know, maybe, Brian, we'll start off with a bit of an intro, kind of a higher level You know, you've been with the company almost a year and a half now. You know, we hosted you with one of your first meetings with investors in New York at that You know, the company's, you know, made a lot of progress, I guess, broad-based, I guess, what would you attribute the progress that's been made and generally how you're feeling about the business?

It's probably momentum is the word I would use, Steve, that if you look across the various portfolio, the companies. Steve, to start with yours, on the Aetna side, since 24, we've been on sort of a steady march to get back to target margin, and Steve's been doing an extraordinary job leading the execution, very disciplined, so a lot of momentum in the Aetna business. If you look at the pharmacy business, similarly, that business was negative for a few years. Last year, we posted mid-single-digit growth. This year, we'll be up mid-single as well, So suddenly the investments we were making in terms of technology, in terms of colleagues, it's starting to pay off. On the Caremark side, we'll deliver the guide this year. So in that sense, they have momentum. We did call out some of the headwinds for 27. But overall, I feel like the business, as it transitions, I see that business getting back to target margins, clicking through after 27. And then finally, the last business, HCD. I feel very good about Oak Street in particular. About four quarters ago, they kind of arrested some of the profit challenges, and it's been slow and steady progress. The last thing I would say is capital. As you think about the balance sheet and leverage, a lot of momentum there. We're getting to a place where we're happy and start to spin off cash. So overall, I think you do all those things. The momentum adds up to a say-do, and you do what you say, and so I think we're building credibility.

And then maybe a similar type of question for you, Steve. I mean, you've been leading the organization now for two years. We've seen significantly improved performance. I guess taking a step back, can you talk about what some of the most impactful changes have been to how you and the team are running the business? And are there specific areas now where you feel like Aetna is now fundamentally better positioned to manage through volatility and compete better in the market going forward?

So just to kind of build on Brian's comments, we do have a lot of momentum. I'll kind of point to some of the reasons for that. But it starts, honestly, for me, when I joined two years ago, the opportunity to participate in an organization that is incredibly well-positioned to have a real, real meaningful impact on the U.S. healthcare system. And so, you know, our ambition is to become the most trusted healthcare company in America and to simplify healthcare. And so Aetna plays an incredibly important role in that. So really, a lot of the momentum of progress we've made starts with aligning our employee base around that purpose. And I know this is not hardcore financial engineering, but this makes a difference. And we've seen a lot of rallying around, hey, we do important work, and people are excited about it. So that's one thing that we started talking about a couple years ago. But then along with that was a real focus on the fundamentals of the business. And so when I say fundamentals, I mean everything from creating a stable operating platform to making sure that we have our hands around forecasting. That leads to then discipline pricing, discipline around how you do MA bids, all those things. Just discipline and strong execution in the fundamentals of the business. or have been a theme and and so very excited about how that has led to this momentum but then on top of that we've been able to really focus on what we call distinction and creating innovation and you know whether it's leading the way in prior authorization form trying to think about how we engage with providers differently helping consumers navigate you know and using we have leading digital capabilities. So all these things are now coming together where we have both the fundamentals and we have, you know, leading capabilities. And we've built a really, really strong team. We have, out of the 13 senior executives at Aetna, 12 are either new to role or new to Aetna in the last two years. And so this is all coming together for us. We have, I'm always going to say we have more work to do, but the competitive positioning that we have I think allows us to navigate sort of the choppy waters that you mentioned better than I would say for sure we could two years ago. And I think honestly better than some of our peers because we have those fundamentals down. So really excited about the progress we've made and very, very bullish about kind of where we're going from here. Okay.

And then, you know, obviously for the industry as a whole, you know, cost trends very front and center given, you know, the past couple of years. As you've gotten, I guess, more run out on the second quarter and maybe some initial indicators for Q3, we'd love to hear what kind of update you can provide on a medical cost trend and where that stands now.

Yeah, so look, absolute costs, I'm going to not talk about trend for a minute, but absolute healthcare costs are still much higher than any of us would like to see them. It's very on the front of our large purchasers' minds, CMS, consumers, you know, so it's not where it needs to be. So we've taken that on. And so I'll start with sort of, you know, some of the very tactical things. We have 2,000 initiatives lined up at Managing Trend. And so, you know, and we're executing really well on all those. And then you get to some of the more innovative, disruptive things that we're doing, whether it's new products. And we see an appetite amongst our large purchasers to try new things and be innovative. So, you know, creating more incentives for people to utilize high-quality providers, for example, and then incentivizing them to make good choices and then empowering them. So we think about navigation, more advocacy, and then leaning into partnerships with providers has been, I think, a hallmark of what we've been doing. And I think you're going to see us have a real breakout there in terms of building trust with providers. And I talked to providers. We actually have in Hartford, there's 40 providers there at a conference gathering we have today. And look, they're tired of the finger pointing as well. And so the idea to get on the same page with them, reduce friction, create more streamlined processes, whether it's prior authorization or just how we help people navigate the system, we want to do that together. And so that will actually lead to lower costs, I believe, if we can execute on that, and I believe that we will. So, look, I think that the trends are, we don't, you know, and Brian can talk about this, but we don't see them necessarily going down. We see some pockets of availability, particularly in Medicare, but it's a high-trend environment. So we remain cautious, prudent in kind of how we're thinking about things because we need to, you know, finish the job of getting our business back to target margin.

Yeah, I know we don't generally comment on inter-quarter trend, et cetera, but net-net, Steve referenced, there were some pockets of favorability in MA in particular, but I think this prudent comment, it's the way we approach our forecasting philosophy of looking out at the balance of the year. I think it's kind of a prudent and respectful view of trend.

Yeah, I mean, maybe that's a good place to take it next. Obviously, MA outperformance was a meaningful contributor in the first half, and I think the way the company has described the results is that you really didn't take necessarily all of the outperformance through into your guidance, so you either reinvest it or sort of put some of that into maybe like the back half of the year. I guess, how do we think about how you set up the back half of the year and potential opportunities for outperformance or reinvestment if Trends days where it appeared to be in the second quarter?

Yeah, I'll catch that. the there were some in the first half of the year some things like PYD and exiting the exchange business so there were some elements flowing in there that you had to account for but we flowed some of the upside through in the balance of the year but Steve it goes back to this this prudent and respectful outlook I think we're building momentum Steve and the team are doing an excellent excellent job in terms of with the discipline and the execution but I think it sets us up for a reasonable as reflected in the guide with opportunities for outperformance.

Okay, great. Maybe one for Steve. As we think about, you know, your MA business, you know, you've made a lot of progress. They'll have a ways to go on the margin front. I guess, how do we think about, you know, the MA margin objectives that you built into your 2027 bids, I guess, to the extent there's any contrast versus 2026 that you'd want to draw? And I guess as you've started to maybe gain some insight competitively, how do you feel like next year looks from a competitive dynamic perspective? and maybe any early leanings on maybe the growth, non-growth perspective?

Sure. Yeah, we took – so first of all, our priorities for Medicare Advantage business are very clear. We need – and we are committed to returning it to the appropriate margins in Medicare Advantage. So the last two years, we've taken that approach and that discipline into the bid planning, and we did the exact same thing for 2027. our key priority is is getting the business back to target margins but the the good news I think you know for us is as we've laid down these really strong foundation of or the last two years we got after it quickly and executed really well in the last two bid cycles and AEP so we've been able to improve our geographic mix our product mix we've landed you know I think better than expected in 2026 in terms of our membership mix we have leading star scores so that's all coming together we're going to take that momentum into 2027 so to the extent that we can find I would say surgical opportunities to have stability in our benefits that's actually good for our members good for future star scores it's good for attention and we can actually now have with less potentially turn in those very you know strategic and surgical kind of geographies and products we can actually have more impact on their health outcomes too so so this is good we think it's really great for our business good for you know our members and so it's positioned well we're going to continue to focus on our margin recovery but at the same time as we have opportunities to be you know thoughtful around certain geographies where we think we can create more stability we're going to do that so we took all that planning in 2027 And, you know, I can't comment much more than that until we see sort of the competitive landscape. But I feel really good about the business going into 27.

And then just to touch on, you know, star ratings, obviously the star ratings process, it's become a lot more volatile in recent years. There's now kind of all kinds of litigation to add to the mix. I guess, how does Aetna manage this key driver, this key input in the current environment? And then, I guess, how do you think about the range of potential outcomes with regard to the STARS program over the next couple of years?

So, look, we're really proud of our track record in STARS. And, you know, we've maintained a leading position. And that's due to really good execution, a great team on this. And then the power of the CBS Enterprise. If you think about kind of the inputs into the stars, whether it's meta-adherence, operational excellence, and then proving HEDIS outcomes, all those things we're really, really good at, and that shows up in star score. So look, we're going to continue to, through sort of the volatility you talked about, we're going to stay focused and strive for excellence there. But, you know, we're in a blackout period, so no opportunity really to comment beyond that. But, you know, really proud of our track record. We're focused on being really great there.

Okay, great. Then maybe we'll leave that there on MA and talk about Medicaid for a moment. Obviously not as large of a business, but still very impactful given, you know, kind of where the industry is fundamentally. I guess where are you expecting, you know, Medicaid margins to land this year? have either rates or costs developed at all differently versus your expectations?

I'm sorry. Medicaid. Medicaid, yeah, I missed the first part. So Medicaid, yeah. Yeah, Medicaid for us is a really important business for us to be in. It's important to our mission, and we take a lot of pride in serving that membership. But we've also been really thoughtful about the footprint and the geography where we are. And so for perspective, it's a relatively small part of our business in terms of revenue and membership. But it's performing very much in line with our expectations. We've had great success in interacting and partnership with our states. Rate advocacy is something that people talk about and throw around a lot, but there's a real skill set there to have the right partnership, the right trust, presenting the data the right way, and we've had good traction with our state partners, and we see trends, I would say, you know, in line with those rates that we've been advocating for, so, you know, it's, that business has made good progress, or we believe it's in a good position to continue to make progress.

Got it, and then, yeah, obviously, the big watch area now seems like it's Medicaid work requirements for the expansion population. I How's the company thinking about that policy change and what it could mean for the pacing of Medicaid recovery and kind of the risk or not you think that presents?

Yeah, I think the work requirements and eligibility and what that does to membership in general. I think there's a lot to play out there and we're gonna continue to work closely with our states. Because states take a lot of pride in offering these benefits and solutions to their populations, and we are a partner with them on that. So we bring solutions, ideas, and opportunities, we think, to create not only great outcomes for their members that they serve, But also, you know, helping them think through solutions and making sure that when there are new policies or new regulations put in place, how do we help communicate to their members, you know, our members, their citizens? How do we work together on that? So that's what we're doing. Like, I think that there's still a lot of game to be played here in Medicaid and how this all plays out. I think states are still kind of forming their strategies and opinions about how they're going to implement these. But so far, we've had, you know, really good, I think, engagement with our states. And I think, you know, it'll play out how it plays out. But we like our position and we like our footprint and the partnerships we have with states.

And it seems like, you know, you've made good progress on margins and hopefully you'll make more progress as we see, you know, 2027 develop. I guess as you think and start to think more about what the business looks like as margins are more fully recovered across the portfolio, what are the things that are most exciting about kind of prospectively once that's occurred and how to think about maybe growth becoming more of an engine for the business going forward?

Yeah, I'm so glad you asked that because there's a lot of things to be excited about. You know, once you get the fundamentals in place, you start getting credibility, not only with investors, but internally and with our employees and then, you know, in particular with our with our members. And so we can take be a little more disruptive and innovative. And so Aetna has a legacy of being innovative in terms of product and clinical programs. And we're getting back to that. And so a few examples. We have, I mentioned earlier, the leading digital capability, so number one ranked website, number one ranked digital app. And the reason that we've leaned into that so heavily is that we want to see our members informed and engaged. And we think if we can do that, and then we can use product innovation like Smart Compare, where you have the opportunity to compare quality providers. You have Alternative Health Plans, our version of that, where we can actually incentivize you to go to those providers. And there's a win-win for everybody there. And then on top of that, we've created clinical programs that are around some of the biggest drivers of trend right now. So, for example, autism. I think the industry spent $460 billion last year on autism. We've created a holistic, really proactive program for folks and families, parents that have kids that are autistic. And we're getting after that and seeing a real impact there. And then we're embedding nurses in hospitals, you know, so they can take a holistic view to the discharge planning process that something we used to do like 20, 30 years ago, but we, we, we, we didn't do that. We, the industry hasn't done that a long time, but we're doing it a new different way with all the technology. And, and so there is, and then, and then just the streamlining and innovative ways that we've led the way in terms of prior authorization reform, these are all going to lead to, I think, lower costs, better experience, and actually better health outcomes. So we're really excited. And I've said this several times, but I've seen more progress, honestly, in healthcare in the last couple of years than I've seen in the last decade. And so we're going to hit the gas on that. And as a lot of a lot of assets to bring to this and I didn't mention this but in my first statement but you know the CVS team is a great team and so I'm proud and honored to be kind of up here on the stage with these guys but also know the team that's not here so so I'm really excited about the future here I will give you a little bit of a break and I can talk about it now for a long time We'll see if we need that at the end or not.

All right. When we think about, you know, obviously one of the key developments in, you know, the quarter for the services business was, you know, the developments with 340B. So I think one thing first that, you know, investors have kind of been clamoring for is some way to maybe approximate the impact 340B is having on the business this year. You know, one framework that's kind of been offered is, you know, hey, is there a way to think about this that maybe it's a similar order of magnitude as the level of incremental rebate guarantee pressure that you're facing? in the business this year, which was around a $250 million item, or not larger or smaller, and then maybe we could kind of start to dovetail that into how we're thinking about, you know, 340B in 2027 as well.

Yeah, I understand the interest and focus on 340B. A couple of thoughts. One, the size of the program has changed, certainly. It's evolving this year and will evolve into next year. The reason we called out 340B, normally we don't talk about headwinds and tailwinds this early in the year during the Q2 call was a desire to be transparent. When we see things, we're sharing them, et cetera. That's part of our management philosophy. That said, I don't see the 340B program going away. It helps a lot of people, so it's there to stay. What I will say is I do see it stabilizing at the end of next year from our lens. I think about the 340B headwinds that existed this year and next year, And we were able to absorb those challenges within the guide for HS this year and so manage it accordingly. As we think about next year, I put out an 844 floor, which was kind of blessing consensus during the second quarter call, to kind of give people a comfort level that that would be the minimum for the enterprise because we have lots of ways to deliver paths to growth. But Larry, you want to give any color on 340B?

Yeah, just maybe emphasize a couple of things that you raised there, Brian. And so, you know, as we think about the 340B program, I know it's been incredibly noisy and continues to be noisy. Like no one's advocating for it to go away. So as we thought about the program, like 26, it's gonna be smaller than it was in 25. The way we're framing guidance for 27, it'll take a step down again, it'll be smaller again. So like Brian said, we think 27 is based on everything we know today is kind of a good proxy for where the program will stabilize. and you know like Brian mentioned when we thought about how to frame this for you all we don't break out individual drivers within HS let alone within pharmacy services within HS that's why we kind of anchored on the 844 as a reasonable floor you know we were pulling that conversation forward a quarter and just to emphasize when we spoke about that 844 you know we did not assume that we needed to do anything heroic or beyond our normal prudent guidance sort of philosophy to get there. So it doesn't assume capital deployment beyond offsetting dilution. It assumes a normal level of prudence and Steve's business, for example, around cost trends, et cetera. So we hope and hope that that kind of gives folks some sort of context on what it is we're talking about in 340B. We also, of course, called out some membership disenrollment that we might see in Caremark given the selling season and what we've seen from some of our health plan customers or what we're likely to see from their enrollment books as we go into 2027.

And then just in terms of, I know you're not going to be incredibly specific about this, but just in terms of the 2027 headwind, is it fair to think that this is similar in magnitude? Are there reasons to think that the headwind's actually bigger? I guess when you think about the key assumptions, it seems like the two things would be annualization of this year's impact and then whether there's further manufacturer actions. I guess how have you thought about those two things?

I think rather than get into kind of 27-specific guide, let us come back. We'll give headwinds, tailwinds in a month or so on the next call and then obviously frame up the segment guide. But I think we're building credibility and a track record from an enterprise perspective. So I don't want to get into the 27 guide on the segment specific.

And then maybe we could come back to some of the comments on the selling season. Obviously, it seems like it's a bit softer. Some of that seemed to be attributed to wanting to make sure the company has the right kind of contract structures in place. When we think about the clients that would be exiting the platform, I guess, is there any way to think about the profitability of these clients? On one hand, you'd think that these are the clients where maybe some of the rebate guarantee issues have been cropping up, like maybe those are not the most sort of profitable customers that you kind of have in your book. I guess, how do we think about what's driving the softer selling season and the profitability impacts of losing some of these customers?

I think everything's relative, and that's important to keep in mind. When we talk about a softer selling season, last year coming into this year, we had $6 billion in new wins. Retention was up in the 99-plus percent. The rest of the industry was more in the average mid-90s. So I think what's happened is we've gotten more disciplined as thinking about the evolution of the model, the op model, and being thoughtful about the risk profile of legacy contracts we want to carry into the new world. So we've been very thoughtful and disciplined, but there's not a big share shift. It's kind of going from that 99s to more in line with the mid-90s, et cetera. So, Larry, you want to color it up?

Yeah, so Brian is correct. So you're talking about a retention rate going from above industry levels to in line with industry levels. You know, when we describe it as being a less robust selling season, Brian is right. We obviously had a very strong selling season last year. We had gross new business wins this year, just less impactful, less robust than we saw in the previous year. And then the other element that we were trying to, you know, signal to you all was that, you know, the messaging that we're hearing that I'm sure you're hearing from some of our health plan customers around, you know, selective exits around the exchanges, you know, exits or plan exits or footprint, you know, shrinking in MA or in Part D. You know, on those points, we have to see how it plays out. We obviously haven't had the enrollment period in MAF, for example. We haven't had a final read on exactly what exchanges are going to look like. So it's going to take time for us to see how that all plays out. But, again, to Brian's point, we want to be transparent. We want to highlight that these are issues that we are considering as we're finishing our kind of op plan.

Okay, great. And then maybe to talk about the pharmacy and consumer wellness business, obviously a big highlight for this year is the performance there. And it looks like you're seeing much better performance in terms of gross profit per script than really you've seen in much of the companies, you know, kind of past, you know, about 10, 15 year cycle. You know, is it as simple as, you know, really the cost vantage model is really playing out as the company hoped? Does it introduce that kind of pioneered that going back a couple of years? Or are there other significant factors that we should be considering there, too?

Yeah, the business is I go back to my opening words of momentum. That PCW business has has good momentum. The team's done a good job. It was tough a couple of years ago, and we were down 5% in terms of the trends. Even during the down times, we chose to invest in the business. We have the new model, obviously you referenced, that's kicking in. We've got some tailwinds from the Rite Aid acquisition. But the core underlying performance of the business, some of the investments we made in the colleagues and in technology is paying off. And we're still doing that. So we're having a good year this year. We've chose to put some money back into technology. So to keep the engine going to more of this last year and this year, we'll see mid-single-digit growth. That's a big step up from the mid-single-digit declines. So I think the trajectory and the momentum of the business has changed, and it's more durable going forward. Candidly, I'm excited about it, both front of the house and back of the house in terms of the pharmacy and the store.

But, Steve, maybe just to add on, I'm so glad you called out Cost Vantage. That's been such an important development for us. And, you know, when we spoke about rolling out CostVantage, one of the things we highlighted was that, like, we want to get to a position where we earn a fair margin on every script that we dispense. And that's been incredibly important. So as you've seen the growth, you know, obviously very high-profile growth in GLP-1s, for example, we earn a fair margin on every GLP-1 script that we dispense on benefit or in the cash market. So as you've seen that growth, that's a tailwind that our PCW segment has been able to avail itself of, whereas that's not true of everyone in the industry. But at the same time, we continue to share our best-in-class cost-of-goods sold and the improvements that we make in our cost-of-goods sold every year, we share that with our payer partners. So our PBM in-house and Caremark, but also every PBM that we are contracted with and payer gets the benefit from the improvements that we make there every single year. Great.

Maybe one follow-up on services. Obviously, we've seen MA results come in better for you, but also for virtually all of your MA peers this year as well. When we think about the performance of Oak Street, I guess, what have you observed so far in the first half of the year? Have you made any improvements to your Oak Street guidance within the overall framework? And I guess how are you thinking about the next couple of years and what is going to drive Oak Street losses down as you move the next couple of years?

Yeah, trend improves. That's going to be a positive for the Oak business. But when I go back to what I mentioned earlier, we doubled down in terms of focusing on the profitability of that business. We took a big impairment last year, remember? And I think since that time, I think it's been four or five quarters, the team has consistently delivered sort of month in, month out at expectations. So arresting the profit decline was a big focus. Now it's continuing to grow and improve the profitability. So I look out to the next couple of years and I think that business will turn positive, which will be a big change for the portfolio. So very positive. Okay, that's great.

When we think about, obviously, AI and AI investment is a huge theme across all of our companies. How do we think about what CVS is doing? Obviously, you have a variety of different businesses. How do you think about the way that potentially that impacts maybe more regulated businesses with the insurance company and targeted margins that investors have come to think about over time?

How do you think it impacts more of the unregulated businesses where margins might have more opportunity to you know be less constrained yeah everybody's talking about AI today maybe Steve I start and then you can kind of bring it to life we we've been investing in technology I referenced in our PCW business Steve certainly investing with the Aetna portfolio but for a while we've actually generated over a billion dollars in productivity we've invested a lot of that backs or it sort of invest today to grow tomorrow the the thing about CVS health I think our approach to AI Steve is it's not just technology to cut cost there's an element here do more with the same from a growth lens perspective and so we're very balanced and looking across the portfolio where can we take the productivity and the technology and leverage it to grow faster and to hit the top line as opposed to just take cost out so there's a governance component as well that I think is really important so to luck leads our technologies group myself there's a group of us who review the where the AI is being deployed Steve in your world there are areas like prior off that we we are very careful about technology maybe yeah so I totally agree with what Brian said in terms of you know obviously part of on the you know CVS but specifically as we think about returning the business target margin our operating cost structure is key to becoming kind of best-in-class health

plan so so our you know we are investing in technology and AI specifically to get to a best-in-class cost structure you know so that's that's definitely part of the agenda but then from there it's capabilities and it's also creating tools that our workforce can use in a better way to make their jobs you know easier and so we're leaning into all those couple examples one and you know helping people to be better consumers of health care and helping our providers out. We actually have now Agenic AI capabilities for our members to schedule appointments. So we can actually schedule appointments on their behalf. This is an agent doing this, and it's incredibly efficient, and it's really thorough, and it makes the experience for both the provider and the member dramatically better. On the colleague side, we have a group of folks that we call end-to-one advocates, and it's like a concierge of medicine kind of approach, and they get inbound and outbound, and they do outbound outreaches as well to help our members navigate their care pathways. But it used to take one of our colleagues 90 minutes to prepare for one of those conversations. Now it takes them two minutes. So this is a better experience, lower costs, better outcomes. And I have numerous examples prior, Brian mentioned, you know, we're now more than 90 percent, you know, approval ratings, you know, within 24 hours and then 83 percent higher in literally real time. And so these are leading statistics. And then you get into operational platforms and credentialing, for example, our providers are really excited here. It used to take us 30 to 120 days to get credentialing done. We can now do that in a day because of AI. So this is going to transform some of the ways we do things, but it's not all about cost of brand's play.

Maybe just the last question then would be on capital deployment. Obviously, the company will likely be increasingly able to deploy capital over the next couple of years. I guess what do we think about as the key priorities and maybe the key kind of contrast points versus the capital deployment profile of the company maybe in the past five or ten preceding years.

Yeah, and just like Steve could talk about Aetna all day long, I could talk about capital all day long. It's been a huge focus of mine since joining the company. We've gone from kind of leverage of five times back in 24, debt to EBITDA. Now we're in the mid-threes, which supports the BBB rating that we want. So we're in a very good place from a capital deployment. I will also share with you we have a framework, total shareholder return, that is a very disciplined approach. We have a capital review committee that meets regularly. Where does the next dollar of our cash go? And so I think you'll continue to see the discipline. But as you said, Steve, it's getting time to turn back on ShareRepo, to look at bolt-on acquisitions, because a hallmark of CVS Health is, across the enterprise, is the ability to generate cash. And so we see that coming back this year. We've said we would turn back on ShareRepo next year. I think we're getting closer to the leverage. So we'll come back and update later this year in terms of if we do that sooner or not. But net-net, we'll be looking at bolt-on acquisitions to support the growth. We're going to support the dividend. I think we've paid down $4 billion in debt this year, so we're making good, good progress on where we're at. But I guess what I would leave with the investors, really confident, really proud of what we've achieved, but a lot of discipline and governance around the deployment going forward.

Okay, fantastic. I think that's all we have time for. Thank you so much for your time today in the discussion. Appreciate it.