The Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) proposed Rule 151A would change the securities status of indexed annuities from fixed insurance products to registered, securities products.

The proposed rule would have a significant impact on their entire industry landscape.  SEC 151A would affect the way in which insurance companies develop fixed indexed annuity (FIA) products, how distributors sell the products, and ultimately the manner in which consumers purchase FIA products.

Concerned about the possibility of another market swoon?

Take a look at some of the living benefits features that can be attached to most variable annuity products to hedge market risk and lock-in a floor of income.

How about inflation risk?

Buy a fixed annuity with inflation protection.

How about capturing a portion of the market upside while also having downside protection?

A recent Wall Street Journal article discusses the range of issues that bond or fixed income investors face in the current environment.

The issue is critical for most retirees and near-retirees as they would typically migrate towards the income producing and low volatility aspects of bonds with a portion of their assets.  

The current environment is tricky, however, since the future path of interest rates and inflation is so uncertain.

Some of the key risks that fixed income investors currently face include:

Business Week just ran a timely cover story on the post-financial crisis retirement landscape.  Portions of the feature present a remarkable contradiction. While there is a clear endorsement of life-cycle investing as a post-financial crisis retirement planning alternative, most of the actual discussion and recommendations are based on conventional approaches—asset accumulation, diversification, asset allocation with relatively heavy exposure to market risk, precautionary savings, and draw-down rates.

Country Financial offers a wide array of insurance products that are designed to cover individuals, as well as manage liabilities. The company's product offerings include auto, home/renters, life, farm and ranch, crop, business, long-term care, disability income, medicare supplement, annuities, and personal umbrella insurance. The company's annuity-related offerings include:

The head of an Australian financial service firm's life operations, Richard Howes, is an advocate of compulsory annuitization.

Howes believes that 30 percent of retirement funding should be compulsorily assigned to guaranteed income streams--in other words to annuities.

Howes also suggests that the relatively slow take-up of annuities in the Australian market is a result of investors who have been conditioned by a uninterrupted 20 year bull market in equities.

Howes spells-out the case for annuities:

A recent article discusses whether it makes sense to consider buying a longevity annuity.

The author addresses the question from an investing perspective.  He provides an example of a 65 year old person who uses $10,000 to purchase a longevity annuity that begins payments at age 85.  At 85, this person would begin receiving monthly payments of $700 that last for a lifetime.

An annuity ladder basically involves spreading annuity purchases over time. 

For example, instead of taking $100,000 to purchase an immediate annuity today, a person might purchase five different $20,000 annuities over a seven year period.

This approach has a number of advantages: