Retirement Income Journal
The information forum of the decumulation industry.

A month after announcing a new “Vision” variable annuity with low costs and a tepid lifetime income guarantee, and two weeks after promoting COO Dean Connor to CEO, Sun Life Financial announced Monday that it was getting out of the annuity business in the U.S.

 “As a result of [a] strategic review,” the company said in a release, it “will close its domestic U.S. variable annuity and individual life products to new sales effective December 30, 2011.

“The decision to discontinue sales in these two lines of business is based on unfavorable product economics which, due to ongoing shifts in capital markets and regulatory requirements, no longer enhance shareholder value.”

In the third quarter of 2011, Sun Life accepted $681 million in new variable annuity premium, mainly for its Master Choice II and Masters Flex II contracts. Its 2011 year-to-date sales were $2.33 billion. It had 1.77% of the U.S. variable annuity market and was in 13^th place in sales for the current year. With $19.2 billion in variable annuity assets under management in the U.S., it ranked 16^th overall with a 1.35% market share, as of September 30, 2011.