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Fiduciary Governance
As a step toward increasing transparency, the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) for the first time has released its annual budget, showing that the 2018 budget does not include a fee rate increase for its member firms, despite certain “evolving” challenges.FINRA’s Financial Guiding...
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The IRS and Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC) are granting relief to those in the Golden State who have suffered due to the recent wildfires, floods, mudslides and debris flows that began on Dec. 4, 2017.This is only the most recent action by the IRS and PBGC to give such Californians a...
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In the functional absence of the Department of Labor’s fiduciary rule, some states have taken matters into their own hands. The latest is New York — but the proposal recently unveiled is of limited scope and notable for what it leaves out.The New York Department of Financial Services’ (DFS)...
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The IRS has issued a revised version of its comprehensive brochure on the retirement plan checkup material it makes available for plan sponsors.TipsThe IRS offers these tips:Watch for law changes. Keep a plan up-to-date with the law and be mindful of what to change in the plan and when to do so. A...
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Implementation of the Department of Labor’s fiduciary rule has been delayed, and the rule may not have the teeth it originally did. But it would be a mistake to assume that means a complete demise for a new fiduciary standard for advisors. That depends in part on what the Securities and Exchange...
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Legislation has been reintroduced in the New Jersey state legislature to require certain disclosures by non-fiduciary investment advisors regarding their fiduciary status with clients.Reintroduced Jan. 9 by state Senator Patrick Diegnan, Jr., (D-Middlesex), along with Assemblywoman Nancy Pinkin (D-...
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What are firms in the retirement industry doing to help protect against cyberattacks and the threat of financial and participant account information being held hostage?A recent Bloomberg News article, “Wall Street Aims to Thwart a Hacking Nightmare for Your 401(k),” reports that there is a...
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The advent of 2018 has brought new requirements for practitioners who contact the IRS Practitioner Priority Service line for assistance.
RSM US LLP, part of a global network of independent audit, tax and consulting firms, recently issued an alert that the IRS has changed its verification...
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The champagne flutes have been put away and offices and schools are open again — 2018 is underway. So what was the top news story of the year that just ended? In a recent post on FiduciaryNews.com, Christopher Carosa shares which subjects he found generated the greatest interest, and suggests that...
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This is the time of year when resolutions for the cessation of bad behaviors and the beginning of better ones are in vogue. Here are three for plan fiduciaries for 2018.Start a diet – for your fund menu.Though it is a point often made with studies (well, one study, actually) dealing with jellies...
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As DC plans continue to grow in size and complexity, the retirement industry needs to keep up and redefine terms to better reflect the new environment, Willis Towers Watson says in a new report.
Picking up where they left off with their 10 new definitions for DB plans, the firmís new report...
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The Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC)’s Participant and Plan Sponsor Advocate, Constance Donovan, has sent the report on the activities of her office in 2017 to Congress. The report highlights its activities concerning participant claims, multiemployer plans, plan sponsor issues and...
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The Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC) has issued a statement on its regulatory — and deregulatory — priorities. The PBGC says that it intends these actions to promote clarity and reduce burden with the goal that net cost impact on the public is zero or less overall.
Most of the PBGC’s...
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Pension plans’ funded status provided something else to be thankful for in November, according to two recent reports.
Northern Trust Asset Management and Mercer report that the average funded ratio for U.S. pension plans rose by 0.4 percentage points to 83.4% in November, according to Chief...
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Bipartisan legislation that would allow for electronic delivery of pension and retirement plan information was introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives Dec 11.Introduced by Rep. Jared Polis (D-CO) and Rep. Phil Roe (R-TN), along with 26 cosponsors, the “Receiving Electronic Statements to...
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An alleged “built-in” flaw in fund design has drawn a fiduciary breach suit by a plan participant.The suit (Birse v. CenturyLink, Inc., D. Colo., No. 1:17-cv-02872, complaint filed 11/30/17) was filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Colorado by Franklin D. Azar & Associates, a...
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The headline of a recent article didn’t pose that as a question. And that should make you think.The article, penned by a not-yet-30-year old, was mostly negative on the nation’s primary private retirement savings vehicle, but to my read, that wasn’t her fault. Rather, it was the net result of the...
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Giving employees the opportunity to manage how their 401(k) funds are invested is one way to help them better integrate their retirement savings efforts into their overall investment strategy. But a recent blog entry reminds that there are fiduciary considerations associated with offering actively...
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Financial wellness programs provide help to participants in achieving their short-, intermediate- and long-term financial objectives — some of that advice is fiduciary and some is not.A new blog post by Fred Reish explains that while recommendations about repayment of indebtedness, budgeting and...
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As employees are asked to take on more responsibility for managing and financing their benefits, new research shows that employees want and need help making better decisions about their benefits.Results from Lincoln Financial Group’s 2017 Employee Benefits Study indicate that a large majority of...
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