Products January 18, 2024

Product & Service Launches – 1/18/24

Morningstar, iCapital expand access to alts; Manulife announces longevity innovation challenge with World Economic Forum’s UpLink; Nassau Financial Group launches fixed-indexed annuity product.

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Morningstar, iCapital Expand Financial Adviser Access to Alts

Morningstar Inc. and iCapital announced a strategic relationship to provide users of the Morningstar Advisor Workstation, a business intelligence platform, with access to alternative investments and analytics.

“This is a game-changer for advisers who are building a modern advisory practice and serving evolving investors’ demands for diversification and personalization,” Vimal Vel, chief product officer of Morningstar Enterprise Solutions, said in a statement.

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The integration equips Advisor Workstation’s more than 170,000 users with alternative investment research and tools to evaluate private assets along with traditional investments. Coupled with investment proposal and report capabilities in Advisor Workstation, the solution allows advisers to build diversified portfolios for clients that include alternative assets.

“Our simple, intuitive technology interface ensures that Advisor Workstation users have access to both the right products for their clients and an extensive library of educational resources to make informed decisions relating to portfolio allocations and diversification strategies,” Lawrence Calcano, iCapital’s chairman and CEO iCapital, said in a statement.

Manulife Announces Longevity Innovation Challenge With World Economic Forum’s UpLink

Manulife announced a new multi-year partnership with UpLink, the World Economic Forum’s open innovation platform, which specializes in longevity innovation. The three-year partnership will include annual Manulife-powered Global Longevity Innovation challenges, run by UpLink.

“Solving this longevity crisis will require a comprehensive approach to promoting healthier lifestyles, addressing socio-economic inequalities, and investing in new research and technologies,” Roy Gori, president and CEO of Manulife, said in a statement. “By working across sectors and with partners like the World Economic Forum, we can focus on driving the longevity economy for the future of society’s health and well-being.”

The Manulife-powered UpLink challenges are intended to accelerate solutions in longevity focused on finance, health and well-being. The program will be activated across Manulife’s global headquarters in Canada, the U.S. and Asia as the company works to drive global change through place-based solutions.

“By combining Manulife’s expertise, UpLink’s commitment to elevating early-stage impact entrepreneurs, and the work of the Forum’s Centre for Financial and Monetary Systems, this initiative will play a pivotal role in promoting healthy aging and enhanced living standards throughout the world,” Olivier Schwab, the World Economic Forum’s managing director, said in a statement.

Nassau Financial Group Launches Fixed-Indexed Annuity Product

Nassau Financial Group introduced fixed-indexed annuity to its product portfolio, Nassau Income Accelerator. Nassau’s latest offering is a single-premium fixed-indexed annuity with flexible guaranteed lifetime income options that help retirees delay, and therefore increase, the date when they begin drawing Social Security and other retirement benefits.

“For retirees faced with the tough decision of when to start their Social Security payments, Nassau makes it easier with our latest innovative annuity product, Nassau Income Accelerator,” Phil Gass, Nassau’s chairman and CEO, said in a statement. “Our goal in developing this product was to offer much more flexibility that would allow individuals to optimize all their retirement income sources.”

By providing options to receive higher income in the early years, Nassau Income Accelerator can help individuals delay their claim on Social Security and other retirement benefits and achieve a higher annual guaranteed income for life.

Issued by Nassau Life and Annuity Co., Nassau Income Accelerator can be customized to fit an individual’s retirement income plan, offering guaranteed lifetime income distributed according to personalized time horizons.

Vanguard Introduces Enhanced Digital Estate Planning Tools to Investors With Vanilla

The Vanguard Group Inc. is introducing enhanced intergenerational wealth and legacy planning capabilities through a partnership with Vanilla, a provider of digital estate planning tools and solutions founded in 2019.

“Within Personal Advisor Wealth Management, clients are provided a dynamic visualization of their estate plan, identifying opportunities to refine and maximize their ability to achieve their legacy goals,” Massy Williams, principal and head of wealth management at Vanguard, said in a statement.

The offer was successfully piloted to a small cohort of eligible advised clients in Vanguard Personal Advisor Wealth Management over the past year and will scale to provide ultra-high-net-worth Vanguard investors. Vanguard began working with Vanilla in 2022 and plans to roll out access to the new estate planning tools to eligible Personal Advisor Wealth Management clients over the coming year.

“Our platform is purpose built by advisors and estate professionals, combining world class design and cutting-edge technology to help firms deliver a holistic, modern estate planning experience to their clients,” Gene Farrell, Vanilla’s CEO, said in a statement.

Practice Management January 18, 2024

How to Properly Document 2024 Plan Meetings

A retirement plan auditing expert provides a primer for recording minutes accurately and with maximum value for retirement plan committee meetings this year.

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The Form 5500 filing deadlines are in the rearview mirror, and you and your plan sponsor clients are into the new year in earnest.

Now you can focus on the current plan year and start making sure your client’s 401(k) plan house is in order and operating at the best possible standards.

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Maybe you represent 401(k) plan clients with thousands of participants, hundreds or a dozen. No matter what your practice focus, there is a key task that all plan sponsors need to perform: documenting minutes from the meetings of the 401(k) plan oversight committee.

Bradley Bartells

Keeping detailed minutes from the meetings of your client’s 401(k) plan oversight committee serves two important purposes. First, in the event your 401(k) plan is selected for a Department of Labor examination, detailed meeting minutes will show DOL examiners that you are performing your plan oversight duties required by DOL regulations.

Second, if your client or the 401(k) plan is sued by participants, detailed meeting minutes will support your defense that the plan fiduciaries are performing their duties with respect to the plan. Generally speaking, this mostly applies to larger plans, but the slew of 401(k) litigation in recent years has even small plan sponsors aware of legal risks.

To get your 401(k) plan advisement off to a good start in 2024, here are a few simple tips to either use with or provide to your clients on how to keep detailed and effective 401(k) committee meeting minutes.

1. The 401(k) oversight committee should be meeting no less than quarterly to effectively monitor the plan and perform oversight duties. If that’s with you, the adviser, terrific. If not, make sure you discuss and help your client with appropriate scheduling and setup.

2. Make sure the client has someone designated to take minutes during the meetings. Ideally, this person should not be a member of the committee so this person can focus only on taking minutes, rather than participating in committee discussions.

3. On a quarterly basis, meeting minutes should include the following, many of which can benefit from a plan adviser’s expertise:

  • Review and approval of the meeting minutes from the prior meeting;
  • Discussion and review of economic activity at a national level and impacts to the plan;
  • Review and discussion of significant 401(k) articles and publications for hot-topic issues;
  • Review plan financial activity during the most recent quarter;
  • Review applicable regulatory guidance issued by the DOL and IRS and its impact on the plan;
  • Review and approval of required plan amendments;
  • Review investment performance with the plan’s investment adviser;
  • Discussion and analysis of investments on the watch list;
  • Decisions to add/remove investments from the watch list; and
  • Ensure fiduciary educational and training sessions are on track.
4. In addition to the above, the following items should be documented annually:
    • Review of the SOC-1 reports for the plan’s key service providers. Typically this will consist of the custodian of the plan’s assets and the payroll provider;
    • Review and approval of the annual compliance testing results, including discussion of any corrective actions needed;
    • Review and approval of the annual Form 5500 filing;
    • If applicable, review and approval of the annual financial statement audit report;
    • Annual review noted of service providers (TPA, custodian, investment adviser, CPAs, etc.);
    • Cybersecurity training for employees and fiduciaries noted; and
    • Review and update of 401(k) plan policies and procedures for needed updates and ratification noted.

    Remember, minutes do not need to include a transcript of every word spoken during the meeting. Minutes should document key discussion topics, actions taken and decisions made.

    In more than 25 years of helping clients with audits in the employee benefit plan, not-for-profit, and city and local government industries, I know the importance of running well-documented and consistent retirement plan committee meetings. In 2024, let’s help as many plan sponsors as possible follow the best practices for their organizations and, ultimately, their participants.

    Bradley Bartells, CPA, is a partner with MUN CPAs in Sacramento, California.

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