Research & Reports
New Coverage: Summaries of I-Share and Low-Cost VA Contracts
This table contains summaries of 62 variable annuity contracts that we have determined to be low cost and /or sold through fee-based advisors…
Concerning Trends in Fee-Based Variable Annuity Contracts
For a number of reasons there is now much interest around the industry in variable annuities built for sale through fee-based financial advisors; with that fact in mind, in this report we’ll provide some perspective...
Reviewing Variable Insurance Fund Filings from October, 2017
This report contains our coverage of noteworthy variable fund filings from October. It was a fairly active time – during the month we saw new fund registrations along with numerous changes to investment platforms…
Some Bright Spots Amid Insurers’ Variable Annuity Sales Results in Q3
After reviewing earnings calls of stock-traded insurance companies we cover regularly, we came away with the impression that for of them, variable annuity results were lackluster, although there were a few instances of modest improvement…
Principal Financial Files New VA Internal Exchange Offer
While we have seen a few insurers offer to buyout owners of vintage guaranteed lifetime benefits for risk-reduction purposes, a company that has taken a different approach is Principal Financial. Earlier this week it filed...
Random Thoughts – on Current Conditions in the VA Market
Third quarter earnings season is now underway, and we are highly interested in what conference calls might reveal about the variable annuity business. We’re suspecting that sales levels might have started improve at least a...
Update: Summaries of New VA Contracts Filed with the SEC in 2017
This table updates our coverage of new variable annuity contracts filed with the SEC in 2017 and contains summaries of 21 registrations…
Another Update – On New VA Contracts and Product Changes
This will be a brief report in which we’ll get caught up with the latest in new variable annuity contract filings, and cover a few noteworthy product changes…
Reviewing Variable Insurance Fund Filings from September, 2017
Last month we saw a good number of interesting variable insurance fund filings, including new registrations, shareholder votes on various issues, and sub-advisory replacements, which we’ll cover in this report…