Beth Kutscher, reporting in Modern Healthcare, says that merger and acquisition activity will probably stay strong in 2016.

Specifically, she predicted:

“Private equity players will continue to scout out primary-care physician practices that have expertise in the managed-care environment. There may be more consolidation of hospital-based medical specialties such as anesthesia, similar to last year’s TeamHealth takeover of IPC Healthcare. ”But, she says, “Possible constraints to some deals are the federal government’s tough antitrust scrutiny and regulatory uncertainty related to the 2016 elections.” The Republicans, of course, continue to threaten to kill the Affordable Care Act but even if they win the White House and retain both houses of Congress that there is a constituency of millions of ACA beneficiaries will make abolition difficult.

Observers also see post-acute care’s big referral pattern bringing it back in vogue and more deals between hospital chains and insurers.
The Fed’s  recent small increase in interest rates  is not expected to have much impact on new projects or already announced projects — for physical infrastructure or for acquisitions.