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February 11, 2013

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Financial and wealth management news for the retirement community

Top News

Some alternative investments lead to losses, fraud charges
Nontraded real estate investment trusts and private loans to new companies are among the complex alternative investments that brokers have sold in recent years to unsophisticated retirement investors seeking to make up for losses in their portfolios. Now, regulators are investigating the trend and, in some cases, pursuing fraud charges against brokers who sold the products to investors. The New York Times (tiered subscription model) (2/10)

Industry Update

Grassley wants to tie Harkin's pension proposal to Social Security
Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, plans to push a privately run universal pension plan before he retires from the Senate, but some Republican have other ideas. Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, says any plan to create a pension system should be coupled with Social Security reform. Harkin says his plan is unrelated to Social Security. The Gazette (Cedar Rapids-Marion, Iowa) (2/11)

Poll: Tech tools appeal more to younger retirement savers
A survey from OneAmerica Financial Partners found that more than 60% of investors younger than 40 consider online retirement calculators to be helpful, compared with 41% of those over 50 who say the same. Twenty percent of those in their 20s and 30s said they get their financial information from blogs, compared with 9% of those in their 40s and 50s who said the same. BenefitsPro.com (2/8)

EBSA: Swaps trading by pension funds won't trigger fiduciary duty
An Employee Benefits Security Administration opinion may ease the concerns of pension-plan sponsors whose brokers were hesitant to execute swaps amid worries about being held to a fiduciary standard. The EBSA opinion says "it does not appear that Congress contemplated that [clearing members] would act as ERISA fiduciaries with respect to plan customers. The swaps regulations ... similarly do not envision" such a requirement. Pensions & Investments (free registration) (2/8)

Forcing retirees to annuitize: Payout restrictions ahead?
Some plan sponsors are looking at restricting the lump-sum payouts most 401(k) account holders take from their retirement savings, an attempt to get more people to convert their defined-contribution assets into annuities. The movement is aimed at getting investors to make their retirement funds last longer. Time.com (2/7)

Financial Literacy

Neb. offers $14,000 in financial-literacy scholarships
Nebraska high-school students who win a financial-literacy competition will receive scholarships. The Nebraska Education Savings Trust is providing $14,000 in college scholarships to be divided among winners of an annual competition, an effort to get more students to participate. Lincoln Journal Star (Neb.) (tiered subscription model) (2/7)

On the Economy

Economists predict U.S. growth will pick up by summer


Reuters

The U.S. economy is poised to accelerate beginning at midyear, generating enough growth to produce a self-sustaining recovery, according to economists surveyed by USA Today. Meanwhile, consensus is growing among economists that a minor fourth-quarter shrinkage reported will be revised to reveal growth, albeit at a sluggish pace. USA Today (2/10), Bloomberg Businessweek (2/8)

Building Your Practice

How to put your firm's performance in high gear
Financial-planning firms can ramp up performance by crafting written succession and marketing plans and sticking to them, and by regularly considering which business model works best, says Mike Durbin of Fidelity Institutional Wealth Services. Those are among five attributes that a Fidelity survey identified as key to financial-planning firms' success. Financial-Planning.com (2/7)

SmartQuote

If Columbus had an advisory committee he would probably still be at the dock."

--Arthur Goldberg,
American statesman and jurist

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	Recent Retirement Security SmartBrief Issues: Friday, February 08, 2013 Thursday, February 07, 2013 Wednesday, February 06, 2013 Tuesday, February 05, 2013 Monday, February 04, 2013			Lead Editor: Ashley Fletcher Frampton Mailing Address: SmartBrief, Inc.®, 555 11th ST NW, Suite 600, Washington, DC 20004