Retirement planning

When you serve a client well during one of the most difficult times of their lives, it’s not just helpful for the client, but it’s also good for your business says Amy Florian, an educator, Schwab Impact speaker and the founder of the Chicago-based loss and grief consulting firm, Corgenius.

Prudential Retirement has strengthened its stable value team with the appointment of Michael Davis as its new head of stable value.

In fact, a couple age 65 might need $387,000 saved in order to be confident of covering their health care costs in retirement, not including outlays for long-term care.

Invesco Distributors, the US distributor for Invesco Ltd.'s retail mutual funds, exchange-traded funds and institutional money market funds, has launched an iPad app for advisors who work with defined contribution retirement plans.

Principal Global Investor has named Mihail Dobrinov head of the emerging market equities team, responsible for the management of $9.3 billion in assets, including portfolio management of the $1.62 billion Principal International Emerging Markets fund and $1.8 billion in Asian regional mandates.

ING U.S.’s Retirement business has hired Sam Ghazaleh as head of Investor Channel Sales for its Individual Retirement Markets, the company’s retail business that provides personal retirement, investment and income guidance and product solutions to pre-retirees, retirees and the rollover markets.

While more than a third of Baby Boomers said they expect Social Security to be a major source of income in retirement, nearly 40% were not confident that the system will have money to pay benefits throughout their retirement, according to a recent survey by MFS Investment Management.

Almost one-third of adults who would like to retire do not know if they could and further do not believe they would ever be able to retire, with women more unsure than men.

56% said that it is “challenging” to “very challenging” to discuss such information.

Among investors aged 21 to 50, 72% report that saving for retirement is their top financial goal, a priority applauded by T. Rowe Price’s resident retirement guru, senior financial planner Christine Fahlund, but most investors are unwilling to take on the necessary risk to improve their retirement savings.

Defined contribution plan participants for the most part seem largely unaffected by updated fee disclosure requirements.

Retirement accounts and contributions are growing bigger, according to Fidelity Investments.

The average 401(k) balance reached its highest-ever at $75,900 at the end of the third quarter, Fidelity Investments, one of the nation’s largest 401(k) providers, reported Thursday.

When the concept of retirement was first mainstreamed in America in the 1930’s, it was largely viewed as having “one foot already in the grave.” For many baby boomers today, it might well mean the same thing.

The election results virtually guarantee that key portions of health care legislation passed in 2010 will go into effect next year, as scheduled. Thus, many clients will face a 3.8% surtax on investment income.

Total estimated outflows from long-term mutual funds were $488 million for the week ended Wednesday, October 31, according to data from the Investment Company Institute.

Peng Chen, current chief executive officer of Dimensional Fund Advisors’ Asia (ex-Japan) subsidiaries and Chairman of Dimensional SmartNest (Dimensional Retirement), is adding another title to his resume.

Jeffrey Carney may be looking for new digs and a new gig.

More than 40% of states have poor pension funding ratios, Morningstar municipal credit researcher Rachel Barkley said.

In addition to the launch of its latest SRI fund, Bethesda, Md.-based Calvert Investments has also announced today the hiring of Amy Mathis as its new director of relationship management.