(insurancenewsnet.com) Lincoln Financial Group announced it has introduced two new products for registered investment advisors (RIAs): a commission-free, single premium immediate annuity (SPIA), Lincoln Insured IncomeSM Advisory and a commission-free deferred income annuity, Lincoln Deferred Income SolutionsSM Advisory.
These new solutions will help fee-only advisors provide options for clients seeking protected lifetime income in retirement to help cover their expenses, and add to the breadth of Lincoln’s portfolio of solutions available for RIAs.
“Lincoln Insured IncomeSM Advisory and Lincoln Deferred Income SolutionsSM Advisory are strong additions to our robust offering of commission-free, RIA-tailored annuity solutions, allowing fee-based advisors the ability to help clients protect their income as they head into retirement,” said Tad Fifer, vice president and head of RIA Annuity Distribution, Lincoln Financial Distributors. “We are focused on offering a broad portfolio of solutions for RIAs who choose to include annuities as part of their clients’ retirement plans, and income annuities can be a good way to help secure life-long or period-certain cash flow with the potential to provide a higher income payout than other available options.”
By providing protected lifetime income, SPIAs and DIAs defend against both longevity and market risk in retirement. Consistent income continues irrespective of market performance. Income annuities can generally provide a higher income payout than other available options, and can be a great way to help solve for given retirement expenses, leaving more portfolio assets for discretionary spending and legacy goals.
Dr. Wade Pfau, PhD, CFA®, professor of retirement income and founder of RetirementResearcher.com, believes in the value of these products. “An income annuity offers a unique source of returns not available from an investment portfolio,” explained Dr. Pfau. “It may provide a cheaper way to help meet a spending goal, leaving more assets to cover contingencies and support legacy.”
Lincoln remains focused on providing solutions that help meet the needs of advisors and how they choose to do business – investing in its capabilities among registered investment advisors (RIAs) and in the fee-only space. Over the past year, Lincoln has made a series of technology integrations with companies, including Orion, eMoney, Envestnet/Tamarac and Redtail. These direct data integrations better support the needs of these advisors and improve their overall business experience, making it easy and straightforward for them to incorporate annuities into their clients’ financial planning strategies.
As part of Lincoln’s focus on ease of doing business with fee-only advisors, the company also recently implemented a more seamless tax treatment of advisory fees taken from certain nonqualified fee-based annuities. This new treatment impacts Lincoln’s fee-based and RIA variable, fixed and indexed variable annuity products (non-SPIA/DIA), and follows a Private Letter Ruling Lincoln received from the Internal Revenue Service, allowing fee-based advisors to deduct fees related to investment advisory services provided for Lincoln annuity contracts without triggering a taxable event for their clients, assuming certain conditions are met. Lincoln continues to grow its distribution among RIAs, offering a broad portfolio of solutions, including variable, fixed indexed, income, and indexed variable annuities. Lincoln sales in the fee-based space have increased more than 150% year-over-year as of June 2019.
