How T. Rowe Price Approaches the ‘401(k) Income’ Market

By bundling a deferred income annuity with a managed payout program, T. Rowe Price's optional 'out-of-plan' 401(k) income tool aims to boost participants' spending power in retirement by as much as 50%, relative to a managed payout program with no annuity.
Anecdotal evidence

Test Your ‘401(k) Annuity’ Math Skills

By Kerry Pechter
Should 401(k) participants pay fees on annuity benefits they don't know they have, and never use? Are 'in-plan' annuity fees 'fixed' if the issuer can change the benefit crediting rate? Someone, somewhere, must know.

Lessons from Britain’s national ‘NEST’ egg program

By Kerry Pechter
NEST is the U.K.'s experiment with a government-sponsored, portable defined contribution plan for low- and middle-income workers at small companies. Most NEST participants are still far from retirement, but NEST's leaders envision them hedging their longevity risk with late-life annuities.
Bermuda Shorts

Briefs from the ‘Bermuda Triangle’

By Editorial Staff
US insurers hold more private equity, but income on PE drops; State Street sued again for recommending Athene in PRT deals; State Street and Apollo to partner on distribution of private assets; Oceanview launches 'Topsider' fixed indexed annuity; Munich Re wants to take longevity risk out of life insurers' PRT deals; LeMay and Bickler to co-lead Individual Markets at Global Atlantic.
How Demutualization Changed Everything

The Feeling Was De-Mutual

By Kerry Pechter
In the 1990s and early 2000s, a wave of household-name mutual life insurers “demutualized” and become stock companies. The conversion was driven by fundamental changes in the U.S. economy and led to fundamental changes in life insurer products and practices. Part I of a special two-part report.

Data Connection

Reinsurance ceded allows annuity issuers to reduce premium and therefore liabilities, data from AM Best shows.

COVER STORIES YOU MAY HAVE MISSED

September 2024

J.P. Morgan Asset Mgt Joins the 401(k) Annuity Race

By Kerry Pechter
To educate participants, JPMAM's ‘My Retirement Income Planner,' an online tool for 401(k) participants, will help them decide whether to cover 25% of their plan savings with an Equitable or Prudential lifetime income...
August 2024

RIJ Launches the 401(k) Income Research Center

By Kerry Pechter
RIJ intends to give plan sponsors, plan advisors, retirement plan service providers and others an up-to-date, easy-to-access source of curated information and competitive intelligence on products and processes that can help 401(k) participants turn...
July 2024

DOL Lets Pension Risk Transfer Rules Stand – For Now

By Kerry Pechter
But the Department of Labor's Employee Benefits Security Administration still has concerns about 'insurers’ ownership structures; exposure to risky assets... and use of affiliated and offshore reinsurance.'