Stable Times Volume 22 Issue 2

Download PDF The biannual publication of the Stable Value Investment Association that covers both industry concerns and association activities. Table of contents: Stable Value Industry Has Diverse Views on Opportunity Presented by Target-Date Funds How America Saves: The Unending Quest to Improve Retirement Savings Habits Employers Advised to Brace for the Next Wave: Generation Z […]
Stable Value Industry Has Diverse Views on Opportunity Presented by Target-Date Funds

The explosive growth of target-date funds, especially in defined contribution retirement plans, is by now a well-told story. Data from Morningstar indicate that assets in target data funds grew to more than $1 trillion dollars by 2017 from about $150 billion a decade earlier. Meanwhile, approximately 80 percent of new participant contributions to DC plans […]
How America Saves: The Unending Quest to Improve Retirement Savings Habits

Convincing Americans to save and invest appropriately for retirement, it seems, is a bit like convincing them to get plenty of sleep, eat healthy and exercise—it can be done, but it’s a never-ending quest that never seems to work for everybody. Since 2000, The Vanguard Group has been studying the behavior of retirement plan participants […]
Employers Advised to Brace for the Next Wave: Generation Z

For much of this decade, businesses have debated at length how to hire and manage millennials—the 82 million Americans born between 1980 and 1994 who now make up the largest generational slice of the U.S. workforce. David Stillman, a generational expert and speaker, suggests it may be time to start focusing some of that attention […]
Can Stable Value Find a Home in Europe?

Amid all the things the U.S. exports to other parts of the world—movies, fast food, soda pop, grain, iPhones … the list goes on and on—stable value funds are conspicuously (to the stable value industry, at least) missing. Robert Whiteford thinks there’s an opportunity to change that. A longtime member of the stable value industry, […]
Most Plaintiffs’ Lawsuits Are Found in Favor of Stable Value

Class action lawsuits involving stable value funds appears to have slowed, and for most defendants is beginning to look more like a minor dust up. The plaintiffs’ bar began filing lawsuits against retirement plans starting in 2006, typically alleging that the plans were paying excessive fees to service providers to the detriment of plan participants. […]
New Tool Helps Advisors Compare, Choose and Monitor Stable Value Funds

A few clicks on a computer mouse can take institutional investors to almost any information they want about a publicly traded stock, mutual fund or exchange traded fund. It’s never been that way with most stable value funds, but Fi360 and Blue Prairie Group, companies that offer a wide range of services to financial services […]
Tech-Savvy Attorney Sees Blockchain Still in Early Stages for Retirement Industry Applications

Blockchain is among the most hyped technologies at the moment, nearly up there with machine learning and other forms of artificial intelligence. Just don’t expect it to become commonplace in the wealth management or retirement industries anytime soon, says attorney Andrew Ray, a tech-savvy partner in the law firm of Morgan, Lewis & Bockius LLP, […]
Uphill Battle: Tax Reform 2.0

The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 whipped through Congress and onto President Trump’s desk at warp speed by Washington standards. Introduced in November, it was signed into law 52 days later. Now comes what looks to be the harder part: making all of those changes permanent, via a package of legislation the majority […]