The company most people mean when they say “UnitedHealthcare” is run by two different CEOs, and that changes the net worth answer. Stephen Hemsley leads the parent company, UnitedHealth Group, and is worth roughly $300 million to $460 million, almost all of it in company stock. Tim Noel runs the UnitedHealthcare insurance division, and his wealth is smaller and largely private.
Here is who holds each job, what the numbers actually are, and why you see such wildly different figures floating around.
Who is the UnitedHealthcare CEO?
There are two roles, and they are easy to mix up. UnitedHealth Group is the giant parent company. Its insurance arm is called UnitedHealthcare. Each has its own chief executive.
Stephen Hemsley is the CEO and chairman of UnitedHealth Group. He returned to the top job in May 2025 after Andrew Witty stepped down for personal reasons. Hemsley is not new to the seat, he already ran the company from 2006 to 2017 before serving as chairman.
Tim Noel became CEO of the UnitedHealthcare insurance division in January 2025. He took over after the previous division head, Brian Thompson, was killed in New York City in December 2024. Noel had spent nearly two decades at the company, most recently running its Medicare and retirement business.
Quick rule of thumb: when people search “UnitedHealthcare CEO net worth,” the biggest, best-documented number belongs to Stephen Hemsley at the parent company, not to the head of the insurance unit.
What is Stephen Hemsley’s net worth?
Stephen Hemsley’s net worth sits somewhere around $300 million to $460 million, based on the UnitedHealth Group shares he reports to regulators. The range is wide because it moves with the stock price, which has swung hard over the past year.
The figure is built almost entirely from his holding of roughly one million UNH shares. When the stock trades near recent lows, that stake is worth around $300 million. When it recovers, estimates climb past $450 million. Different trackers also count his holdings on slightly different dates, which adds to the spread.
You may also see a headline claiming Hemsley is worth over a billion dollars. That number is not supported by his public share filings and appears to blend in career earnings and guesswork. The stock-based estimate is the one you can actually check against filings with the SEC’s EDGAR database.
How Hemsley built his wealth
Hemsley’s fortune comes from a long career at one company, not from founding a startup or a big outside windfall. He joined UnitedHealth as chief operating officer in 1997, became president in 1999, and took the CEO role in 2006.
During those years the company grew from a large insurer into one of the biggest companies in the United States, with 2025 revenue of about $447 billion. Long-term stock awards, granted and vested over decades, are what turned his salary into a nine-figure net worth. Before UnitedHealth, he was a managing partner and chief financial officer at the accounting firm Arthur Andersen.
What does the UnitedHealthcare CEO get paid?
Pay and net worth are not the same thing, but pay is easier to pin down because the company reports it each year. Here is what the top leaders earned in 2025.
| Leader / role | 2025 total pay | Base salary |
|---|---|---|
| Stephen Hemsley — CEO, UnitedHealth Group | ~$61 million | $1 million |
| Tim Noel — CEO, UnitedHealthcare | ~$20.2 million | ~$0.98 million |
| Wayne DeVeydt — CFO, UnitedHealth Group | ~$14.6 million | — |
Two details stand out. Hemsley agreed to a $1 million base salary with no annual cash bonus, plus a one-time $60 million stock option award that only pays off if he stays and the shares perform over three years. Tim Noel, running the insurance arm, earned about $20 million in total, mostly in stock.
Net worth of past UnitedHealth leaders
The people who led the company before Hemsley’s return are worth comparing, because their names still come up in searches.
Andrew Witty, CEO of UnitedHealth Group from 2021 to 2025, holds a far smaller stock stake, worth around $21 million in filings, though outside estimates that fold in his earlier career put his wealth closer to $40 million. He ran the drugmaker GlaxoSmithKline before joining UnitedHealth.
David Wichmann, who led the company from 2017 to 2021, still holds a large block of shares worth several hundred million dollars on paper.
Richard Burke, who founded the company in the 1970s and stayed on the board for decades, is worth around $1 billion, making him the wealthiest figure tied to UnitedHealth.
Why the figure is hard to pin down
A clean, single number does not exist, and that is worth understanding before you trust any one source. Three things move the answer.
The stock price. Most of the money is in UNH shares, so the net worth rises and falls with the market every single day.
Timing of filings. Executives report share changes to regulators, but not in real time, so trackers estimate from the last known holding.
Private assets. Homes, cash, and outside investments do not show up in stock filings, so the public figure is a floor, not a full picture.
For the most current holdings you can read the raw ownership forms yourself on the company’s investor relations page, which links to its regulatory filings.
Frequently asked questions
Who is the CEO of UnitedHealthcare?
Two people share the label. Stephen Hemsley is CEO of the parent, UnitedHealth Group, since May 2025. Tim Noel runs the UnitedHealthcare insurance division, a role he took in January 2025.
What is Stephen Hemsley’s net worth in 2026?
Roughly $300 million to $460 million, based on his UnitedHealth Group shares. The range is wide because most of it is stock, so the value shifts with the share price and the date of each estimate.
How much does the UnitedHealth CEO get paid?
Hemsley took a $1 million base salary with no annual cash bonus, plus a one-time $60 million stock option award. Tim Noel earned about $20 million in total 2025 pay, mostly in stock.
Is the UnitedHealth CEO a billionaire?
Not based on public filings. Hemsley’s checkable, stock-based wealth is in the hundreds of millions. Company founder Richard Burke is the figure closest to billionaire status, at around $1 billion.
Why do net worth estimates vary so much?
The wealth is mostly UNH stock, so it moves with the market daily. Trackers also use different filing dates and cannot see private assets like homes and cash, so numbers disagree.
Conclusion
If you want one answer: the UnitedHealth Group CEO, Stephen Hemsley, is worth roughly $300 to $460 million, nearly all of it in company stock, while Tim Noel leads the UnitedHealthcare insurance division on about $20 million a year in pay. Treat any single billion-dollar headline with caution, and lean on the stock-based range, since that is the part you can check against official filings.
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