Research & Reports

Based on our continual reading of regulatory filings, we see evidence that insurers are exercising ever more care in crafting the fees and expenses they charge on variable annuity contracts and riders, and we think...

We honestly look forward to each quarterly earnings season for publicly-traded insurers, because the statistical reports and conference calls always contain plenty of useful information on variable product sales. In this report we’re going to...

Needless to say, there’s been an abundance of new guaranteed living benefits coming out this year however this week we’re shifting our focus to check back in on new variable annuity contract registrations, something we...

It’s time again for us to catch up on what’s been happening with variable annuity lifetime withdrawal benefits because there have been numerous new filings lately, as well as a few developments from elsewhere in...

Ever since we started publishing our weekly commentaries we’ve been noting how the variable insurance business has steadily been offering more sophisticated underlying investments, and in September there were a few developments related to this...

We’re always on the lookout for real concrete data on variable annuity living benefits and to that end we’ve been combing through insurers’ quarterly financial supplements and statutory statements to extract whatever information is publicly...

This table commences our coverage of variable annuity Guaranteed Minimum Income Benefits (GMIBs) that are currently available for sale in the industry…

This week we’re going to step away momentarily from our customary labors – sorting through contract and rider filings, categorizing them and summarizing them – to consider how the unique complexities of variable annuities have...

Even though there are many more lifetime withdrawal benefits on the variable annuity scene today, we maintain that Guaranteed Minimum Income Benefits (GMIBs), due to their unique attributes, are still highly valued by financial advisors,...