Over the years, the life settlement industry has had its ups and downs. During its heyday in 2007 and 2008, consumers sold $12 billion in life insurance death benefits to investors in the secondary market. But the economic downturn dried up investor money, and as late as 2015, just $1.7 billion in death benefits changed hands. (1) For many years, life insurance provided just two [...]
Less than a year ago we reported that AM Best published a special report in which the rating firm issued a negative outlook on the US life insurance and annuity market. They cited the continuing low interest rates, a flattening yield curve, regulations, potential for market corrections and the need for innovation as the major reasons for the outlook. The report highlighted one potentially harmful [...]
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 in 2018, we thought we would “chunk it down” in 2019 with the TOLI Challenge—a series of questions designed to test the knowledge of the typical TOLI trustee. We [...]
Life insurance premium financing is a specialized strategy that has gained favor in recent years for high net worth individuals looking to purchase large life insurance policies without tapping their personal or business cash flow. For these qualified wealthy individuals, the retained capital that would go to pay a premium can be better utilized for investment opportunities they believe will outperform the cost of the [...]
Near the end of last year we posted a blog reporting the 2019 dividend payouts for the big four mutual companies, all whose primary product line is whole life insurance. 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 [...]
