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Research & Reports

Soleares Research, LLC is a market research and consulting firm servicing the annuity and life insurance businesses. We provide, through our website, periodic articles that cover important industry trends; we also offer clients phone or on-site consultations, executive briefings and presentations. We pride ourselves on first-class customer service and responsiveness to our clients. We aim to be an indispensable resource to the marketplace.

Lincoln’s VA/LTC Combo – Still in the Pipeline and a Topic of Conversation

Sometimes it takes an annuity insurer several attempts to get a new product up and running, especially if it is a first for the industry. Such has been the case with a long-term care benefit...

VA Contract Update – Designs Moving in Specialized Directions

Judging by new variable annuities we’ve seen registered with the SEC this year, we get the impression that a good number of them were built to meet very specific needs and issues of distributors. It...

Competitive Notes – “Must Have” Features for VA Products, Riders

Over the recent past, product filing around the variable annuity industry has been somewhat slower than usual, which to us suggests that any moves companies are making are meaningful from a competitive standpoint. In this...

GLWB Update – Newest Riders Contain Risk-Related Components

There’s little doubt variable annuity insurers are carefully monitoring their benefit risk levels, leading them to come out with new Guaranteed Lifetime Withdrawal Benefits (GLWBs) with elements that will make adjustments to ward off the...

Reviewing Variable Insurance Fund Filings from April, 2010

During the month of April most variable insurance fund filings with the SEC were routine prospectus updates, and we didn’t identify a great many substantive changes and adjustments, but in this report we’ll share with...

Odds and Ends – Catching Up on Product Filings, Tweaks Around the Business

The prospectus update season might have been quieter than usual, but in recent weeks we’ve seen an interesting assortment of variable annuity product and feature filings, most of which will take effect during July and...

Variable Annuity Sales from 1Q10 – Could The Industry Be Back on Track?

The fortunes of the variable annuity business are still largely dictated by the performance of companies with the most attractive guaranteed living benefits, and, based on some improvement we saw from a few insurers we...

GMABs and More – Currents of Activity in VA Prospectus Updates

Last week we saw a surge in SEC filings related to variable annuities – many of them May 1 prospectus updates – and in our next few reports we’ll comment on interesting things we found...

Spring Tweaking – VA Product Changes Emphasizing Income, Protection

So far this year we’re seen a number of variable annuity insurers start building in higher guaranteed annual withdrawal amounts (GAWAs) on their lifetime withdrawal riders. Some of these new schemes have been rather creative,...