
Research & Reports
Newer Products Blur Distinctions Between RILAs, Other Annuities
Lately the surging sales of registered index-linked annuities (RILAs) have led insurers and other financial firms to join the bandwagon and come up with variations on them. We’re not sure whether all these new designs...
Some Thoughts on a Very Active Fixed-Index Annuity Pipeline
Lately we’ve started to cover fixed-index annuities (FIAs) more closely, and in so doing noticed that part of the market has been quite active in terms of product development, this despite a decline in sales...
An Outlook on the Summer 2021 Variable Annuity Product Pipeline
Variable annuity filing activity tends to slow down during the summer, however this year we expect things to be a bit different. A good number of insurers have not weighed in with certain in-favor products,...
Q1 Earnings Review – Annuity Sales Improved For Some Insurers
For most of the public insurers we regularly track, annuity gross sales improved in the first quarter, building on momentum the industry generated over the latter part of 2020. Net flows for several carriers were...
Covering Filings of VA Contracts and GLWBs – and a New RILA
In this commentary we’ll get caught up with filings of new variable annuities, registered index-linked annuities (RILAs) and guaranteed lifetime withdrawal benefits (GLWBs) that have been submitted to the SEC recently. While taking stock of...
Reviewing Recent Filings – Containing RILAs, CDAs and GLWBs
In this commentary we’ll get caught up with product filing activity of recent months, in which we saw plenty of new concepts entering the pipeline – most of them related to registered index-linked annuities (RILAs),...
Some Springtime Storylines for the U.S. Annuity Business in 2021
Now that spring is upon us, the worst of the COVID-19 crisis hopefully over, and the first quarter of the year is drawing to a close, we have started to get a handle on where...
Commencing Our 2021 Tracking – of VA Benefit Rate Sheet Changes
Since it’s become ever more common for insurers to design variable annuity benefits with components that can be changed periodically via rate sheet, we now consider the monitoring of such benefits as one of the...
An Outlook on Registered Index-Linked Annuities – as We Enter 2021
This year we intend on providing our subscribers with more in-depth coverage of registered index-linked annuities (RILAs), firstly because we expect their sales to continue outpacing all other annuity types, secondly because we think insurers...