Lion’s Share
ING U.S. Retirement will combine its own target date funds with the AllianceBernstein three-insurer annuity platform to offer a lifetime income option to its 52,000 small and mid-sized plans.
The Outer Limits of Outsourcing
Advisors can’t do everything themselves. But they need to be careful in choosing what to hand off to a software tool, a vendor or an assistant.
Four Income Planning Tools
Here are brief reviews of four noteworthy but not-widely-known retirement income planning software tools, provided by the publisher of Virtual Office News and the T3 Newsletter. Mr. Bruckenstein is also a CFP.
About those Embedded Derivatives
The variable annuity with a lifetime income benefit--sometimes known as an exotic put option or an embedded derivative--was a product that has come back to bite many of the companies that sold it. Was this product ever the best solution for the Boomer retirement challenge?
Featured
The Deleveraging Blues
After a credit boom and bust, we face a long period of spending less and saving more, writes the well-known author and NYU Stern School professor.
News
Bond funds grow, stock funds shrink in 2011
Bond funds saw net inflows of $116 billion during 2011, while equity funds saw net outflows of $51 billion for the year, according to Strategic Insight.
One in five millionaires would pay more tax
But 65% just want to be left alone by the government to enjoy the wealth they’ve earned, an annual PNC survey shows.
Wirehouses are down but far from out: Cerulli
Although their headcount is down and their images are tarnished, wirehouses remain the kings of investment distribution, according to a report from Cerulli Associates.
Investors more optimistic in 4Q 2011: John Hancock
More than half of all investors surveyed said they expect to be in a better position financially two years from now compared with today.
The Bucket
Brief or late-breaking news from Jefferson National, Lincoln Financial, and F-Squared Investments.
The Abandonment of an Ideal
The gulf between the reality of wealth distribution in America and our ideal wealth distribution is what the “one-percent” controversy is really about.
