Up here in New England, the temperature has taken a turn for the colder. I am once again late doing the shoveling so unfortunately, I will be dealing with hard snow; alas, the price of laziness!

As I write this, I am happy to note that I followed through on my resolution to post on my blog on the last Friday of each month. Such little victories are important. I will look to continue the trend in 2026.

How have your holidays been going? Are you taking time to recharge? I hope so. Along with that, I assume you are starting to evaluate the past year and set goals for the new one.  Don’t rush to those tasks! Take time to reflect.

In my view three main factors contributed to the annuity sales boom in 2025: strong performance from the stock market, having come back from the dip in April; sturdy interest rates for much of the year, which helped spur fixed annuity sales; an increase in “money in motion” in the form of contracts coming out of their surrender charge periods, most of which (I gather) were moved into new products.

I have heard that the industry should expect increased surrenders – that is, compared to historic levels – at least through the middle of 2026. What will happen after that, well, we shall see.

I think the circulating money prompted insurers to offer the kinds of rich bonuses, rider rollups and income rates we have seen of late.

But conditions change, right? The Federal Reserve has initiated a cutting cycle. That will impact fixed annuities and income annuities certainly. The VA side is not as correlated to the stock market as in years past. I think RILAs will hold up well; are they “all weather” products? I am not ready to say that.

Recently the annuity industry sleigh ride has been a pretty smooth one. But I would encourage companies to prepare for some bumpiness ahead, even if it ends up being mild. Don’t be like me, the guy who waits to shovel a bit too long!