Research & Reports
About Optionality – in the Newest GLWBs and Income-Taking Methods
It’s our view that variable annuity insurers right now are experimenting with contract and rider designs that are geared to provide greater flexibility than ever before, both from the company’s perspective and that of its...
New Coverage: New Guaranteed Lifetime Withdrawal Benefits Filed in 2015
This table commences our coverage of new variable annuity Guaranteed Lifetime Withdrawal Benefits (GLWBs) filed with the SEC so far this year…
New Coverage: Summaries of New VA Contracts Filed with the SEC in 2015
This table commences our coverage of new variable annuity contracts filed with the SEC so far in 2015…
Tendencies in New VAs and Lifetime Withdrawal Benefits Filed this Year
This report will discuss variable annuity product trends and serve as a companion piece to the new Featured Research we published today covering new VA contracts and lifetime withdrawal benefits registered with the SEC so...
Musings on the VA Industry as Q1 Ends – and on Recent Product Filings
The first quarter will conclude tomorrow and it’s our view that variable annuity business sales probably did not pick up very much, if at all, during that time period…
A Brief Update on Variable Product Managed-Volatility Portfolios
In this report we’ll get caught up with trends in variable managed-volatility portfolios, which over the past few years have been gathering assets at a fairly rapid pace. We’ll also share a few corrections and...
Update: Variable Insurance Volatility-Managed Portfolios
This updated spreadsheet of variable insurance volatility-managed portfolios contains data through the fourth quarter of 2014, and incorporates some adjustments to the data set. By our count there were 193 such portfolios in operation, containing...
Reviewing Variable Insurance Fund Filings from February, 2015
This February we saw a fairly large number of new variable insurance funds get registered with the SEC, which is typical for the time of year, as insurers prepare to update their products in May....
Brief Thoughts on 2014 Annuity Sales – and the Future of the Business
We reviewed fourth quarter and full-year 2014 annuity industry sales and they came out pretty much as we expected they would – variable annuity production was down but fixed annuities, led by those of the...