The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia expedited Indianapolis-based Anthem's appeal of a district court's order to block its proposed $54 billion merger with Bloomfield, Conn.-based Cigna.
In a Feb. 17 court filing, the D.C. circuit court set the oral arguments for the case for March 24. In addition, the order states "no requests for extensions of time will be considered."
The order comes two days after a Delaware Chancery Court judge ruled in favor of Anthem, momentarily banning Cigna from motioning to unilaterally end the payers' agreement.