Research & Reports
VA Insurers Attempt to Design Attractive – But Manageable – Guarantees
A dilemma for insurers working in the variable annuity space these days is how to offer guarantees without taking on undue amounts of risk. To our minds this consideration is a priority for the industry,...
Reviewing Variable Insurance Fund Filings from July-August, 2012
In this report we’ll get caught up with variable insurance fund developments from July and August. During those months we detected an interesting mix of new registrations, fee and expense adjustments, reorganizations and manager changes…
Newer Annuity Types That Are Emerging During this Period of De-Risking
For the most part, variable annuity insurers are moving away from selling risky benefits, but we think that the process of de-risking will take time, because industry sales are still largely driven by the richest...
As Summer Winds Down, More VA De-Risking Moves are Occurring
Lately we’ve been seeing fresh product reductions taking place around the variable annuity business, and we think that the effectiveness of such moves will depend largely on how each insurer will look, competitively, after making...
Reviewing VA Guaranteed Benefit Assets, NAR Movements From Q2
At different points in the past we have combed through quarterly financials of stock-traded insurers for data related to variable annuity guarantees, in an effort to gain insight on how such benefits might be impacting...
Earnings Season Review: VA Insurers Weathered Q2 Market Dip
We were under the impression that second quarter sales for variable annuity insurers might have suffered due to the drop in the equity markets, along with the effects of various de-risking moves – which are...
VA Insurers are Following Through – With a Fresh Series of De-Risking Moves
Around the variable annuity industry there are some pending product changes that will soon be taking effect that we will discuss in this commentary. In looking at them as a group, we are reminded of...
Hot-Button Issues for VA Insurers as Q2 Results Start to Come In
Second quarter earnings season for stock-traded insurers has gotten underway and we are very much looking forward to hearing how variable annuity players performed because in our opinion, the quarter was a stressful one…
Reviewing Variable Insurance Fund Filings from June, 2012
In the past, June has been a rather slow period in terms of developments related to variable insurance portfolios. This year, however, fund filing activity picked up, and we have to think that there is...