Fiduciary

Investment News columnist Darla Mercado wrote an interesting piece of the difficulty of making meaningful comparisons among annuities and related retirement income products. Mercado focuses on the challenges created by the lack of benchmarks in the retirement income industry. Unlike the investment industry where benchmarking and transparency of product features are standard, lifetime income products are opaque and complex. Mercado examines the defined contribution plan sponsor market where...

Those interested in understanding the differences between Registered Investment Advisors ("RIA") and traditional stockbrokers should read this Bloomberg article --this is one of the clearest and best articles that I have seen on the topic. Coverage of this issue is typically slanted in favor of the RIA because they are held to a fiduciary standard. The thinking is that the RIA model will be relatively objective and free of conflicts because it is largely fee-based . The Bloomberg article does a...