Retirement planning

A growing number of employers are planning to incorporate annuities into their 401(k) plans as companies look for ways to provide workers with steady benefits in retirement, according to a survey by Watson Wyatt.

Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus, D-Mont., dropped efforts to temporarily extend the estate tax at its current level in the face of Republican opposition.

Putnam Investments announced Wednesday that its suite of target Absolute Return Funds has surpassed $1 billion in assets, less than a year after they were launched.

Many target-date retirement funds are still heavily invested in risky, high-yield junk bonds in order to give investors the yields they promise, Bloomberg reports.

Symetra Life Insurance Company has launched a group variable annuity for the 403(b) and 457 marketplaces, with schools and nonprofits in mind.

Of the companies that have suspended matching contributions to their 401(k) plan, nearly half, 46.7%, have either already reinstated the match or plan to do so in the first quarter of 2010, the Profit Sharing/401k Council of America found. Among large companies, 52.7% have restored the match or plan to do so.

Participation in 401(k) plans, regardless of age or income, rises according to the size of a company, according to a report from the Employee Benefit Research Institute.

Generation Y, those between 22 and 33, have taken the financial crisis to heart and have become more conservative about their finances, Fidelity found in a TNS Global survey of 1,017 people in that age bracket who hold a job and earn at least $15,000 a year.

U.S. Labor Secretary Hilda Solis said that one of her top regulatory goals for 2010 is helping to ensure people don’t outlive their retirement savings by increasing public awareness of annuities. Solis also believes 401(k) plans should offer annuities.

While the market may have recovered significantly in the second half of the year, many investors’ portfolios are back to 1999 levels, resulting in a “lost decade” of investing, AARP Financial said.

The Insured Retirement Institute is applauding the confirmation from Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Mary Schapiro that her staff is developing a variable annuity summary prospectus. IRI has long called for—and officially petitioned—the SEC to develop such a document to advance the interests of the investing public, and to reduce the burden placed on its members, which includes insurers, to produce lengthy documents that consumers traditionally ignore because of their complexity.

U.S. Senators Jeff Bingaman (D-NM), Johnny Isakson (R-GA) and Herb Kohl (D-WI) have introduced a bill aimed at helping Americans save enough so that they will not be in danger of outliving their retirement savings.

The House’s decision to extend the current estate tax rate did not come as a surprise to industry observers, who never believed the government would allow the tax to expire altogether and give up the much needed revenue.

OppenheimerFunds Retirement Services announced new resources Wednesday to help 401(k) plan participants, sponsors and advisers navigate difficult market cycles and a constantly evolving marketplace.

Between the market rally and 401(k) investors’ steady contributions, balances are higher than what they were before the financial crisis hit, according to a Vanguard report, “Recovery in 401(k) Balances,” based on an analysis of the 1.7 million investors that Vanguard serves. What’s more, despite the intense scrutiny on target-date funds, some of which dramatically lagged their benchmarks in 2008, portfolios invested solely in target-date funds did better than others.

European private equity firm Permira has acquired a financial services firm devoted to retirement preparedness, Just Retirement, for $374 million. This marks Permira’s first financial services investment since setting up a sector team devoted to the industry last year.

Fidelity Investments is offering its Fidelity Personal Retirement Annuity on the platform of managed accounts provider FundQuest. Thus, the low-cost variable annuity will be available to investors through fee-based advisers, marking the first time Fidelity has worked with a turnkey asset management firm.

Lincoln Financial Group has launched the Lincoln MYGuarantee Plus single premium deferred fixed annuity. It is available for qualified plans (IRA and Roth IRA) through partner firms and the Lincoln financial network.

Despite the financial services industry's downsizing, New York Life Investments is building up a sales force to target the defined contribution market.

PALM BEACH, Fla. - Almost a year after new rules governing 403(b) retirement plans for educational and non-profit workers were supposed to take effect, plan sponsors, vendors and third-party administrators are still struggling to comprehend the myriad of changes.