MassMutual Rediscovers the Immediate Annuity
A few years ago, MassMutual mothballed Jerry Golden’s SPIA tool for advisors. Now, post-crisis, the company has re-embraced SPIAs, and sales are up.
Channel Surfing for Low-Cost SPIAs
Where can you find lowest SPIA prices on the web? RIJ compared prices at Immediateannuites, Income Solutions, Fidelity and (as a benchmark) Cannex. And the winner was...
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.
Understanding the Black Investor
African Americans in general have fewer assets, less faith in Wall Street and less appetite for risk than whites, but their need for financial guidance is arguably that much greater.
Featured
VA Update from Ernst & Young
Leading up to the May 1 deadline for contract changes, issuers continued to tinker with every aspect of their contracts--to reduce overall risk and to align their compensation formulas with advisor preferences.
News
Letter to the Editor
Curtis Cloke, an Iowa-based financial advisor and deferred income annuity specialist, responds to last week's lead story, "Channel Surfing for Low-Cost SPIAs."
Social Security trustees issue annual report
The Social Security and Disability Insurance trust funds may be a figment of accounting, but the funds' trustees continue to calculate the changes in payroll tax rates and/or benefit levels that would keep the funds solvent until the last surviving Boomer reaches age 121.
Dollar to share power with euro and renminbi by 2025: World Bank
The growth of emerging-market firms in global investment and finance will bring "the sort of multilateral framework for regulating cross-border investment that has been derailed several times since the 1920s," the bank's report said.
Many job-changers unsure what to do with savings: Fidelity
Separately, the Boston-based firm reported that the average 401(k) balance rose to $74,900 at the end of 1Q 2011, an all-time high since Fidelity began tracking balances in 1998.
The Bucket
Brief or late-breaking news from New York Life, Bankers Life and Casualty, F-Squared Investments, AnnuitySpecs and National Planning Holdings.
Speculation About Jackson National
If Jackson National de-risks its variable annuity offerings, it would merely be following the example of competitors like Prudential and MetLife. Jackson's parent also has to consider Solvency II.
