An In-Plan Annuity with Three Life Insurers

By Kerry Pechter
Asset manager AllianceBernstein and three life insurers—Jackson National, Lincoln National, and Nationwide—are offering their Secure Income Portfolio deferred variable annuity (with income rider) to plan sponsors as a retirement drawdown tool.

For Ibexis Life, Cayman Outshines Bermuda

By Kerry Pechter
This Missouri-domiciled life insurer epitomizes the asset-manager-driven life/annuity companies that have been disrupting the U.S. life/annuity business since 2010 or so. In its first year selling fixed indexed annuities, it sold $453 million worth.

Life Insurers as LEGO Monsters

By Kerry Pechter
Michael Gordon, CEO of Axonic Insurance, part of Axonic Capital, sees the future of the life/annuity/asset-management business as an increasingly a la carte affair, where the components of the business are like interchangeable Lego blocks and where platform providers help clients snap them together.
Featured

The Stakes in the Romney-Obama Contest

By Knowledge@Wharton
Expect big changes next January? Think again. While the candidates' economic philosophies and positions are dramatically different, divided government will prevent either from bringing his version of Morning to America, predicts a Wharton School professor.

To De-Risk or Re-Risk, That Is The Question

By Ashish Kapur
Pension fund managers across the Pond are feeling boxed-in. The author, European head of institutional solutions at SEI, feels their pain in an essay that first appeared in IPE.com.
News

Britain adjusts to universal auto-enrollment

By Editor Test
“Many organizations are still in a head-in-sand mode,” said Dean Wetton, a pension consultant. “Auto-enrollment is lost somewhere between payroll, HR and the pensions department."

DALBAR validates Pacific Life funds as QDIAs

By Editor Test
The PL Portfolio Optimization Funds are five target-risk fund-of-funds, ranging from conservative to aggressive, that are designed to offer investors one-step diversification.