Research & Reports
Reflecting on the GMIB – And Its Current Place in the VA Industry
While the number of guaranteed minimum income benefits (GMIBs) has dropped dramatically from years past, a few still remain for sale, and in this report we will discuss them, and share thoughts on how they...
Reviewing Variable Insurance Fund Filings from June, 2016
This report will cover variable fund filings from June that we found notable. During the month a significant amount of activity we saw involved changes to sub-advisors and fees…
Reviewing Variable Insurance Fund Filings from April-May, 2016
In this report we’ll get caught up with noteworthy variable fund filings from the months of April and May. We didn’t see too many new fund registrations during the two months; most filings involved adjustments...
More Thoughts on Recent Variable Annuity Prospectus Updates, Changes
In our view, variable annuity product filing activity is still rather slow compared to prior years, so for that reason we’ll devote this report to touching on just a few developments, some which we have...
American General Launches GLWB with Highest Daily Ratcheting
Lately we haven’t seen too many variable annuity insurers make their living benefits more generous, but American General introduced a new lifetime withdrawal benefit yesterday which is now one of the few in the industry...
Reviewing Variable Insurance Fund Filings from March, 2016
During March the pace of variable fund filing activity was pretty lively in our view, and among interesting developments was the introduction of a new sub-advised trust from insurer Guardian Life…
An Update on Variable Insurance Managed-Volatility Portfolios
In this brief commentary we’ll touch on trends in managed-volatility portfolios, drawing on year-end 2015 data we gathered from SEC filings, which show how assets under management in this subset of the variable fund universe...
Reviewing Variable Insurance Fund Filings from February, 2016
Each year February is a month when a large number of new variable insurance funds get filed with the SEC in preparation for their eventual addition to contracts during the May prospectus update season. This...
Puzzling Out Meanings Within Recent VA Contract and Rider Filings
In this commentary we’ll discuss some variable annuity product filings with the SEC from recent weeks that we found interesting, some of which, we’ll admit, have elements we are not yet totally clear on…