07.29.20
The Fiduciary Rule Was Great for Variable Annuity Buyers: Economists
by: Allison Bell
Three economists — Mark Egan, a faculty member at the Harvard Business School; Shan Ge, at New York University’s Kaufman Management Center; and Johnny Tang, at Harvard’s Littauer Center — have come out with a working paper saying the original DOL fiduciary rule effort cut sales of high-expense variable annuities by 52 percent. Overall, variable annuity sales fell about 19 percent after the rule was issued in 2016, but the drop was due mainly to a decrease in sales of high-expense variable annuities. “The results suggest that, in response to the proposal of the rule, brokers began complying with the rule by placing greater weight on investor interests,” the economists wrote.
Read the full article on Think Advisor.