What’s Your Competition Doing? E&Y Knows
Launched five years ago, Ernst & Young's Retirement Income Knowledge Bank has become a useful map of the competitive landscape for insurers and broker-dealers.
At SPARK conference, a Plug for In-Plan Annuities
In touting his firm's LifePath TDF-based deferred income option, Chip Castille of BlackRock emphasized that insurers should position in-plan annuities as retirement income enhancers rather than longevity risk mitigators. (I.e., appeal to greed, not fear.)
At Your Service: Courting the Affluent Tennis Fan
Prudential Financial, Raymond James, ING, Fidelity Investments and E*Trade all advertised during the French Open final between Rafael Nadal (above) and Roger Federer on NBC TV last Sunday--all vying for the "elite demographic" that follows tennis.
Who’s Afraid of the Big Bad Debt?
Not Warren Mosler, bond trader, racecar dabbler, Senatorial candidate and recent author of “The Seven Deadly Innocent Frauds.”
Featured
SPIA Flow at Fidelity: $70M-a-Month
Sales began going up after Fidelity incorporated SPIAs into its online retirement planning tools: the Income Strategy Evaluator and the Guaranteed Income Estimator.
News
Vanguard issues annual DC report
"How America Saves," now in its 10th edition, is a compilation of data from Vanguard's 2,000 defined contribution plans, which cover three million participants with about $400 billion in assets.
Fixed annuities from three small insurers make Barron’s “smart” list
While smaller than most of the other 15 companies on the list (see today’s Data Connection), Life Insurance Co. of the Southwest, Royal Neighbors of America and The Standard have strong ratings--and a whiff of counter-culture about them.
RBC Wealth Management ranks first in “satisfaction” survey
The annual J. D. Power and Associates U.S. Full Service Investor Satisfaction Survey also found that most people don't understand the difference between the "fiduciary" and "suitability" standards of advisor conduct.
AARP disavows reports of its reversal on Social Security
In Washington, AARP's CEO denied earlier statements by his own policy chief that the organization was open to future cuts in Social Security benefits if the cuts made the PAYGO system more financially sustainable.
Your financial crisis is different from my financial crisis
New research from Olivia S. Mitchell of Wharton’s Pension Research Council et al shows that financial crises are felt differently by the young and the old, and by those who either suffer “triple whammys” or are “doubly fortunate.”
The Bucket
Brief and late-breaking items from DTCC, Fidelity, MetLife, Charles Schwab, Strategic Insight, PLANSPONSOR, Sun Life Financial, Lincoln Financial Distributors, John Hancock and Retirement Plan Advisory Group.
Annuities, Sudden Darlings of the Media
Positive articles about annuities are certainly welcome—especially at a time when a relentless interest-rate drought is desiccating their value—but recent pieces in Barron's and the New York Times didn't advance the annuity dialogue very far.
A $100 Billion Market for SPIAs?
Income annuities aren't a good product fit for every insurance company. But for New York Life, a mutual company with tons of reserves and a big book of life insurance, they make perfect sense.
