A big insurer is expecting to see strong growth at the PatientProtection and Affordable Care Act public exchange system in2015.

Stephen Hemsley, the chief executive officer of UnitedHealthGroup Inc. -- a company that is selling qualified health plansthrough only a few PPACA exchanges this year -- said today during aconference call with securities analysts that the company will sellQHPs through "nearly two dozen state exchanges in 2015," up fromfour this year.

Another executive, Gail Boudreaux, head of the company'sUnitedHealthcare health insurance unit, made a point of talkingabout the company's hopes for the PPACA exchange system.

"We see this market a really good long-term growth opportunity,"Boudreaux said.

Jeff Alter, the head of the commercial health insurancedivision, said the company has no confidence in anyone's exchangeQHP enrollment forecasts but believes growth will be strong.

"We think the second vintage will be better," Alter said. "Wethink the third vintage will be better yet."

Earlier, UnitedHealth executives had talked about not includingthe new PPACA temporary risk-management programs, and a permanentrisk-adjustment program, in pricing.

See also: Morecarriers flock to PPACA exchanges

Alter said the company will be using a temporary reinsuranceprogram, which protects QHP issuers against enrollees withcatastrophic claims, and the permanent risk-adjustment program,which is supposed to help shift money to issuers with high-riskenrollees from issuers with low-risk issuers as the year goes on,but that the company will not use the riskcorridors program. The risk corridorsprogram is supposed to use cash from insurers with goodunderwriting results to help individual coverage issuers with poorunderwriting results.

The executives talked about the exchange system while going overthe company's third-quarter earnings.

UnitedHealth is reporting $1.6 billion in net income for thequarter on $33 billion in revenue, compared with $1.6 billion innet income on $31 billion in revenue for the third quarter of2013.

• The company ended the quarter providing or administering healthcoverage for 45 million people, about the same as a year earlier.Enrollment in commercial plans fell 4 percent, to 29 million.
• New PPACA taxes cost the company $1.3 billion in the thirdquarter, and taxes increased the company's income tax rate for thequarter 5.8 percentage points, to 41.8 percent.
• Despite concerns that PPACA might increase claimscosts, at UnitedHealth, the commercial medicalratio fell 2.2 percentage points year-over-year, to 79.1 percent.The underlying cost of medical care may increase about 5.5 percentthis year, up from an increase of 5 percent in 2013, Altersaid.

The company said the consumers who were able to enroll inMedicaid because of the PPACA Medicaid expansion program are usingsomewhat more care than other Medicaid enrollees, but that thecompany expected the increase and included the effects of theincrease in the rates it's charging states to participate in theirMedicaid programs.

See also: UnitedHealth’sPPACA tech unit boosts results

Boudreaux also took a question about "dumping" -- decisions bysmall employers to shut down health plans and dump workers into thePPACA exchange system.

UnitedHealth sees a continuing decrease in the percentage ofemployers that offer health benefits, but it has seen no suddenincrease in the number of small employers shutting down theirhealth plans. In some cases, Boudreaux said, UnitedHealth might seesmall employer decisions to shut down their plans as a way to getworkers who were in self-funded plans that UnitedHealth simplyadministered into fully insured UnitedHealth QHPs.