Product Leaders
Variable Annuities
• Jackson Perspective II
• Sammons Livewell VA
• Allianz Index Advantage
• Pacific Life Choice 2
• AXA Structured Capital Strategies Plus
Fixed & Indexed Annuities
• Nationwide New Heights
• Allianz Benefit Control
• Athene MaxRate 5
• Mass Mutual American Legend
• Brighthouse Fixed Annity
Mutual Funds
• John Hancock Disciplined Value
• AMF Growth Fund
• Invesco Van Kampen
• Wells Fargo Special Mid Cap Value
• AMF Money Market
Variable Life
• Equitable COIL
• Nationwide BOA
• Voya VUL
• Pacific Life Select
• Mass Mutual VUL
Fixed & Indexed Life
• Allianz Life Pro Plus
• Pacific Discovery Xelerator IUL
• Global Atlantic Lifetime Builder
• Pacific Life Xelerator
• Nationwide New Heights IUL
NEWS FROM: INSURANCE AND ANNUITIES
Jackson National: Increased Joint Guaranteed Income
As annuity products continue to evolve, Jackson is committed to Innovating features and benefit to allign with your business model and client needs. On their variable annuitiesm the following will be made to their add-on LifeGuard Freedom Suite of living benefits.
Equitable: Will Taxes Really be Lower in Retirement?
Considering the impact of taxes on retirement income is an important part of insightful planning. Based on demographics, recent economic events in the U.S. associated with the pandemic, and thought and policy leadership on many fronts, lower taxes in the future seem unlikely.
Nationwide: Is Big Tech’s Dominance Over?
One way to examine changing trends in stock market performance is to analyze sector weighting changes for the S&P 500® Index. These recurring shifts in the composition of the benchmark stock Index can offer insight into how different factors, such as cyclicality, long-term growth potential and valuation, may impact stock performance in the future. Currently, the Information Technology sector is the largest S&P 500 sector by weight, accounting for around 27% of the Index.
Prudential: Work & Money Outlook
Younger generations are demonstrating notable shifts in attitude about work and life, taking drastic measures to bring balance to their lives, according to Prudential Financial, Inc.’s latest Pulse research survey, “Generational Gap Grows: Work & Money Outlook Divided.” The survey finds that while millennials and Gen Z’s are attracted to more flexible ways of working, they are far more likely than Gen X’s or baby boomers to turn to gig work, go into debt, or receive financial support from relatives to meet their financial goals.
American Funds: Will the Global Economy Tip into Recession?
Most of the world’s economies are in or near recession, thanks to slowing growth, the war in Ukraine, a lingering pandemic, high inflation and rising interest rates. One potential bright spot? Recessions historically haven’t lasted very long — about 10 months on average.
Hartford Funds: Pivoting From Innovation and Growth to Value
Are we transitioning from the post-Global Financial Crisis market regime to something new? What could that mean for asset allocators and portfolio positioning? While allocators can’t assume they’ll be able to spot the next regime’s winners, they can be careful about their exposure to the prior winners and think broadly about which areas of the market are likely to offer more compelling returns over the next 5-10 years.
Jackson National: What If I Retire Today?
This part of the picture is not ideal. When you consider how incredibly fast the inflation rate rose from a long, comfortable period of lows to today’s historic highs, pausing to evaluate current economic conditions may seem wise. In the span of just one year, the inflation rate notched its largest increase in 40 years in June with consumer prices up 9.1%. This was the biggest 12-month increase since the year that ended in November 1981, when the consumer price index reached 9.6%.
Pacific Life: Retirement Contributions in 2023
How can clients make an IRA contribution for last year? Send it to the IRA custodian prior to the tax-filing deadline (April 18, 2023) and note that it is for a 2022 contribution. Note that if it is a SEP-IRA contribution, the custodian doesn’t report the tax year to the IRS — only the contribution year. The taxpayer is responsible for reporting the contribution year.
Transamerica: February Fed Meeting
As expected, the Federal Reserve raised the federal funds rate by 0.25% to a target range of 4.50-4.75% at its February meeting, reflecting its smallest rate increase since March of last year. Regarding this development and the overall interest rate environment, we see two more 0.25% rate hikes between now and midyear, thereby concluding the current tightening cycle. It would be our best assessment that the Fed will increase the fed funds rate by one-quarter point at both its upcoming March and May meetings and then hold for the rest of 2023.
Allianz: Russia’s War Economy
Ukraine’s economy is expected to stabilize this year, but downside risks loom large. After a contraction of output by -34% last year, we expect real GDP to grow marginally by about +1% in 2023. However, the ongoing war creates large downside risks to the economic outlook, especially the ongoing destruction of vital infrastructure. Since October 2022, electric power has been rationed in Ukraine through rolling blackouts. The annual rate of inflation has accelerated from 10% to more than 25% and shows no signs of abating. Both growth and inflation outturns have put enormous pressure on fiscal accounts despite large-scale foreign aid.
NEWS FROM: ADVISORY
CLASSIC Plus FlexUMA
Product Leaders Advisory
• Centaurus CLASSIC +
• SEI
• Freedom Advisors
• The Pacific Financial Group
• CLASSIC Plus FlexUMA
CLASSIC Plus FlexUMA is a Unified Managed Account (UMA) solution that provides a powerful and integrated investment platform for IARs to grow their business and provide robust advisory solutions to clients. FlexUMA features ETF Select and UMA/Multi-Manager portfolio models that can be utilized individually or blended together for custom allocations. FlexUMA is available on the TD Ameritrade Institutional platform.
ETF Select
A low-cost turnkey solution for smaller and price-sensitive clients that provides a selection of managed risk-based portfolios from leading ETF strategists (BlackRock, Morningstar and Vanguard).
CLASSIC Plus FlexUMA
CLASSIC Plus FlexUMA is a Unified Managed Account (UMA) solution that provides a powerful and integrated investment platform for IARs to grow their business and provide robust advisory solutions to clients. FlexUMA features ETF Select and UMA/Multi-Manager portfolio models that can be utilized individually or blended together for custom allocations. FlexUMA is available on the TD Ameritrade Institutional platform.
ETF Select
A low-cost turnkey solution for smaller and price-sensitive clients that provides a selection of managed riskbased portfolios from leading ETF strategists (BlackRock, Morningstar and Vanguard).
UMA/Multi-Manager
UMA/Multi-Manager provides a selection of single- or multi-manager models from industry-leading and boutique managers under one platform. It also provides access to a vast array of models such as stop loss strategies, sector rotation, tax-free income, inflation protection, global markets, institutional investing, hard assets, alternatives and much more.
CLASSIC Plus Morningstar Manged Portfolios
Morningstar® Managed PortfoliosSM provide IARs with the ability to open actively managed ETF and Select Equity Portfolios within a Pershing advisory account on the CLASSIC Plus platform. The Morningstar ETF Portfolios consist of core models from conservative to aggressive growth that are actively managed to create diversified, low-cost and tax-efficient portfolios for your clients. The Select Equity Portfolios provide a series of model and customizable portfolios spanning the stock market that combine the professional management of Morningstar with the advantages of having a separately managed account.
SEI: A New Path to Growth
Competition for clients and advisors is heating up in the wealth management space as the industry grows and demographic shifts reshape the market. At the same time, more conversations in recent years have centered on changes in consumer behaviors and values — conversations that are changing the way people and businesses live, work and relate to one another. In this new normal, more firms are reconsidering the notion of values, from defining and refining them to evaluating the role values have in their businesses. For wealth management firms, it comes down to two pillars of your business: empowering employees to succeed and earning client loyalty.
TPFG: Understanding New Wealth Management Client Expectations
The wealth management industry, while historically slow to evolve, has undergone significant changes over the last few years. As the client base becomes accustomed to digital-first service experiences in other sectors, wealth management firms are being pressured to respond in kind. An industry once characterized by in-person meetings and one-on-one interactions is being forced to reevaluate how it carries out its business. However, the advance of digitalization should not be confused with an aversion to personalized or human-led interactions to deliver a winning wealth management client experience. In fact, quite the opposite is true. While clients want more convenient access to their portfolios and advisors, this convenience cannot come at the expense of quality.
SEM: It’s a Process
In today’s “always on” society, we’ve become accustomed to quick actions. We want quick resolutions to problems and believe if something goes on for too long it will “always” be that way. Sometimes, it is important to take a step back, study history and unbiased data and unplug from the constant noise. We are seeing many
investors become impatient with investment account losses. The question of when the losses will be made up were on many of our attendees’ minds during our latest SEM University. In case you missed it, here is the link to the replay. We broke it into two parts – the 15-minute “outlook” and the Q&A. We address the question of losses and how long it will take to recover in the Q&A.
OceanPark: 10-Year Treasury Yields to Break Even
2022 was the worst year in history for core fixed income, and many investors are wondering how far yields need to fall to get back to break even. Break even yields are estimated based on current yield, duration, convexity and average bond price of the Bloomberg U.S. Aggregate as of 01/31/2023.
Advisors Capital Management: Red Hot
Everyone was blown away by the huge 517,000 January increase in payrolls and upward revisions to earlier months, the decline in the unemployment rate, and the surge in the workweek. These numbers imply that it would be premature for the Fed to pause rate hikes and irresponsible for them to contemplate a pivot to reduce rates. The large gains in hiring indicate that the economic expansion remains on a solid footing, and the risks of recession lie a bit further in the future. We have been pushing our recession forecast out for some months now and must do so again. However, the risk of recession has also increased. The economy has even more momentum than we observed prior to this report, so it may take somewhat higher interest rates to restrain growth and rein in inflation, making a “soft landing” harder to achieve. It is safe to speculate that Fed officials were not happy with such strong job growth.
Freedom Advisors Turnkey Asset Management Platform: What if You Could Outsource to 100 CIOs?
According to “Pensions & Investments,” demand for outsourced chief investment officer services by institutional investors has surged by 86% since 2017. Why? Because investing has become much more complicated and, coupled with increased market volatility, doing it properly demands more time and focus from advisors, time that they don’t have or would rather spend growing their business and helping clients realize their financial goals. Now, consider how valuable it would be to outsource to 100 CIOs instead of just one!
With one CIO you are subject to the biases and limits of one person, as well as the risk of departure of that individual. Consider the brain power, reach, access and combined experience of 100 CIOs supported by hundreds of investment professionals and leading-edge research systems. Freedom Advisors makes this possible.
NEWS FROM: ALTERNATIVE INVESTMENTS
Product Leaders
Alternatives
• US Energy
• Smartstop
• Cantor Fitzgerald
• Mill Green Partners
• Triton Pacific
Griffin Realty Trust: Plan to List on the NYSE
Griffin Realty Trust Inc., a publicly registered non-traded real estate investment trust formerly known as Griffin Capital Essential Asset REIT, announced a plan to pursue a listing of the company’s common shares on the New York Stock Exchange. As The DI Wire reported in August 2020, the company announced its “strategic monetization process” that included spinning off a new public company and liquidating the remaining assets as a result of the company’s review of strategic alternatives.
Cottonwood: NAV Updated
Cottonwood Communities Inc., a publicly registered non-traded real estate investment trust focused on multifamily real estate investments, has reported its monthly net asset value per share/unit of its common stock and operating partnership units, as of January 31, 2023. At the close of January 2023, the NAV per share was approximately $19.22, compared with $19.58 the previous month.
