What is most important when determining the liability of a trustee’s actions? Over the years, we have noticed that the knowledge of TOLI trustees varies from trust company to trust company. After publishing the TOLI Handbook, we thought we would “chunk it down” with the TOLI Challenge—a series of questions designed to test the knowledge of the typical TOLI trustee. We will be publishing questions [...]
In the almost 15 years we have been managing life insurance policies, we have never encountered a situation where a life insurance carrier volunteered to give back money. Oh, sure, you can surrender a policy and get money back, or take a loan or withdrawal on your policy to get some cash, but at a cost. Recently we received a letter from a carrier [...]
Why Now Is the Time to Consider Alternatives for Your Irrevocable Life Insurance Trusts (ILITs) Presenters: Leon Wessels, Life Insurance Trust Company, John Barkhurst, ITM TwentyFirst For most institutions in 2021, life insurance trusts are not core to their trust business. With the regulatory, reputational, and legal risks ever increasing, many corporate trustees are currently rethinking their ILIT services, contemplating other alternatives. This webinar [...]
Millions of businesses worldwide have drafted or purchased business continuity plans, some have even practiced or simulated implementation of said plans, but few ever dreamed a worldwide pandemic would force these plans into action. The rapid spread of the Covid-19 virus has impacted all of humanity, including thousands of businesses which include fiduciary services. For those who serve as a fiduciary or provide fiduciary support [...]
Dividends are a return of premium when carrier results exceed a very conservative projection for investments, income, and expenses. Dividends are paid annually on participating whole life insurance and determined at the discretion of the board of directors. They are paid in addition to the guaranteed cash values in the policy, but the dividends themselves are not guaranteed and will fluctuate. Over the last twenty [...]
As a TOLI trustee, you have a fiduciary responsibility to ensure that every transaction - either a new policy sale or replacement is not only suitable for your client, but also in your client’s best interest.
An online survey about life insurance found that 33% of life insurance policy owners do not understand how their policy works. (1) I suspect that this number is probably low. Perhaps the other 67% think they know how it works, but I imagine they could get a refresher lesson. Even if a policy owner does understand how it works, do they understand how a decade [...]
In the 1980s when current assumption universal life (CAUL) hit the market, sales illustrations were created showing cash value returns of 10% and more every year – for a product that was invested in fixed instruments. When equity markets soared and variable universal life (VUL) became the rage, many sales illustrations projected 12% returns – again, every year. Life insurance illustrations are at best a [...]
Executive Summary: The 3rd wave of the pandemic was the most widespread and deadly. Through 2020, we did not find evidence of protection on Life Settlement lives from COVID. However, in January 2021, at the peak of the 3rd wave, we saw the first signs that vaccines may be reducing excess mortality in Life Settlements. Many Life Settlement lives are in the highest [...]
In our last two blogs, we discussed when and how to sell a life insurance policy. In this blog entry, we want to talk about the taxation of a life insurance policy sale for the seller. The death benefit of a life insurance held in trust is received free of both estate and income taxes, however, if a TOLI life insurance policy is sold, [...]
