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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.
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“Next Generation” VA Withdrawal Benefits and Shapes They Are Taking

The rate of filing activity around variable annuity Guaranteed Minimum Withdrawal Benefits (GMWBs) remains vigorous and will probably pick up as we approach the May prospectus update season. Since the beginning of the year some...

Public Insurers’ Q4 VA Results Point to Overall Improvement for the Industry

For the fourth quarter of 2006 variable annuity sales grew for all the publicly-traded insurers we track, reflecting the experience of the industry as a whole, which we hear rebounded from the lackluster sales of...

Dueling GMIBs – The Arms Race Persists on Base Growth, Special Provisions

We’re constantly maintaining that the importance of living benefits to the variable annuity business cannot be overstated. Although most of the market right now is concentrated on lifetime withdrawal benefits, there’s been resurgence in competition...

Impressions on the Variable Annuity Business in 2007 – Part II

In this report, our last of the year, we’ll conclude our two-part commentary summarizing key forces influencing the sale of variable annuities in 2007 – our main three being “features, shelf space and scale” –...

Insurers Fine-Tune Their VA Living Benefit Guarantees – Continued

This week we’re going to continue on the theme of our previous commentary by noting more adjustments insurers are making to their variable annuity living benefits, fees and related provisions…

A Simpler Story – Insurers Move to Streamline VA Sub-Accounts, Features

In getting started with the New Year, we’ll comment on a growing tendency for insurers to trim the number of sub-account options and features on their variable annuities in order to make them simpler for...

VA Contract Trends – More Immediate Income Products on the Horizon

This year we haven’t seen as many new variable annuity contracts being registered as in the past, a fact we think reflects current conditions like the consolidation of market share, the competition around benefit features...

Seeing VA Business Priorities Revealed Through Public Insurers’ Q3 Results

The third quarter was a mixed bag for the nine major public variable insurers we regularly track, as all saw sales levels fall sequentially, but apparently these companies don’t feel the results were troubling and...

Beyond the VA “Arms Race” – Towards Meeting Retirement Income Needs

A sentiment we’ve been hearing from industry executives lately is that the variable annuity business already has a plethora of products and features due to the competitive “arms race” that has taken place in recent...