From an IVA, New Blood for Insurers

Life insurers, advisors and consumers should embrace his immediate variable annuity (IVA) with a refund option and a death benefit, says Achaean Financial CEO Lorry Stensrud.

Mad About 401(k) Annuities

Part I: ‘Keep Your Hands Off My 401(k).’ Based on their recent e-mails to the Labor Department's RFI, some Americans think Uncle Sam wants to confiscate private savings.

The Savings Sweepstakes

Lottery-like savings programs aren’t widely legal in the U.S., but a Harvard Business School professor believes they could inspire more low and middle-income Americans to save.

The Goldman Touch

The complex deal at the heart of the SEC’s case against Goldman Sachs may reveal Wall Street to be a labyrinth or casino, but it doesn’t necessarily establish fraud.
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Regulate Ratings Agencies More or Less?

Sen. Al Franken (D-MN), the former "Saturday Night Live" comedy writer, wants an independent panel to assign Wall Street deals to rating companies.

Fidelity Launches Corporate Bond Fund

The fund will track the Barclays Capital U.S. Credit Bond Index, a value-weighted index of investment-grade, corporate fixed-rate issues with maturities of one year or more.

Nervous Americans Not Flocking to Annuities

Total annuity sales for the first quarter were $47.4 billion, down 6.9% from $50.9 billion in the previous quarter, and down 27%, from $64.4 billion in the first quarter of 2009.

A Sobering VA Outlook, Via Cerulli

"The industry is still feeling the fallout from the Great Recession," Cerulli's Lisa Plotnick tells RIJ. "But the bad news is not unaddressable."