A big theme in the retirement savings world next year will be emergency savings accounts. Starting in 2024, a provision of the Secure 2.0 Act kicks in that allows employers to add emergency accounts alongside their 401(k) plans. Those Roth-style accounts will be able to hold as much as $2,500...
If there is one thing that supporters and opponents agree on about ESG, it might be that there are too many interpretations of its meaning. This week, several groups, including the CFA Institute, gave a list of definitions that they want to be standard across the industry. That includes common...
The Biden administration has singled out annuities in the DOL’s proposed fiduciary rule, and the stakes are high for independent insurance agents. In the long-awaited proposal released Tuesday, the Department of Labor explained that financial professionals who make one-time recommendations for rollovers from 401(k) plans to annuities will not get...
Advisors who make one-off recommendations to 401(k) plans and participants may face a new reality under the latest fiduciary rule proposed by the Department of Labor: They will be fiduciaries, whether they like it or not. Tuesday, the agency proposed a rule that would again redefine “fiduciary” under the Employee...
This fall could be an unusually stressful time for families with children planning to start college next year. The cause: Many will be guessing about how much they will have to pay or borrow for tuition. Not only are they awaiting acceptance letters, but there’s a two-month delay in Federal Student...
Another company is settling fraud charges from regulators amid a widespread crackdown on precious metals dealers that target retirees. The firm, Safeguard Metals, along with its sole owner, Jeffrey Ikahn, allegedly defrauded customers to whom it marketed gold IRAs of $68 million, according to two separate lawsuits brought by the...
Affluent investors have been pouring money into separately managed accounts and turning slightly away from mutual funds, a new consumer research report shows. As of 2022, 22% of U.S. households that invest had SMAs, up from 13% in 2020, according to data published Thursday by Hearts & Wallets. Meanwhile, mutual...
The financial advice business isn’t what it used to be — and many in the profession say that’s a good thing. With investment management effectively being outsourced to the dizzying number of model portfolios and home office research services available, stock picking just isn’t the main selling point of an...
It’s been nearly a decade since BlackRock closed a line of iShares target-date ETFs for which it had high hopes. At the time, the products, like other ETFs, had struggled to win a place in 401(k) plans. They attracted $310 million — an extremely modest figure for the world’s largest...
The concept of retirement is changing, and many people preparing for it are realizing that they can’t fully quit their working lives as soon as they’d like. The reality is working longer or taking a gradual retirement, where part-time jobs help bridge financial gaps. The average age at which people in...