Insurable Interest Canadian Insurance Blog

Tuesday’s vote fell along partisan lines with the FTC’s three Democrats in favor and the agency’s Republicans opposed. Melissa Holyoak, the former solicitor general of Utah who joined the agency last month, said she was opposed to the rule because there was “no clear congressional authorization” for the FTC to issue it. Republican Andrew Ferguson also voted against the rule, saying he was sympathetic to the policy in the rule but doesn’t believe courts will uphold the FTC’s rulemaking authority. “The administrative state cannot legislate because Congress declines to do so,” Ferguson said. In a call with reporters Monday, the Chamber’s Chief Policy Officer Neil Bradley said the FTC doesn’t have the authority to issue the rule. ‘Micromanaging’ Economy The rule “opens up a Pandora’s box where this commission or future commissions could be literally micromanaging every aspect of the economy,” Bradley said. “Agencies can’t exercise authority that Congress hasn’t given them. Congress has not given the FTC the ability to write regulations with respect to competition.” The agency’s Democrats, however, maintain that the FTC does have authority to issue rules defining unfair methods of competition. The final rule also rejected the idea that the agency doesn’t have the authority to issue...

It sounds like a surefire, slam-dunk trade for stock investors playing defense: ETFs that will bet on equity markets without — the pitch says — going down. Calamos Investments filed Monday for so-called “structured-protection” exchange-traded funds that will track a portion of the returns of the S&P 500, Nasdaq 100 and Russell 2000 while hedging 100% of the downside via the options market, according to a Monday filing. The first fund launching within the suite is the Calamos S&P 500 Structured Alt Protection ETF, which aims to match the price return of the SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust (ticker SPY) up to a cap of 9.20% to 9.65%. The catch: Investors looking to reap the full protection will need to buy it on launch day — May 1, 2024 — and hold it, come rain or shine, through April 30, 2025. After that, a new defined period of cover kicks in. CPSM, like others in the upcoming ETF lineup, will primarily invest its assets in derivatives by buying and selling a combination of call and put options to cushion against market volatility, according to the fund’s prospectus. A regulatory filing notes there’s no guarantee the fund will be successful in...

What You Need to Know Maybe you have thought about this before. Certainly, some of your clients have. What about the other ones? Working women ages 40 and up often juggle career and family obligations in a way that virtually no other demographic group does. Often at the peak of their earning power, many women in their 40s, 50s, and 60s are also primary caregivers for younger members of their families, and frequently for one or more parents or in-laws as well. Given these responsibilities, it’s no surprise that women often postpone thinking about their own future, particularly when it comes to potential extended care needs. Managing Today’s Responsibilities Often Means Neglecting Tomorrow’s Needs An extended care plan is especially important for women as their life expectancy is roughly five years longer than men’s, meaning many women may find themselves living for years without the assistance of a partner. But, in a 2023 Thrivent survey, only 16% of women said they have an extended care plan in place for themselves. The same Thrivent survey shows many women recognize that paying for extended care would be a challenge, but many don’t have a full picture of what those costs are likely...

This underscores the challenge that local business owners face competing with major brands for clients, Cerulli said. “These overall preference levels present a bit of a challenge to emerging registered investment advisors and independent broker/dealer advisors, as they rarely possess high levels of unaided awareness among prospective clients in their periods of critical advice need,” Scott Smith, Cerulli’s director of advice relationships, said in a statement. According to the research findings, neither advised nor unadvised investors favored advisory practices that offer only online engagement options. These garnered just 1% from the former and 5% from the latter. Interestingly, however, 12% of both unadvised investors with less than $250,000 of investable assets and those with more than $5 million favored online-only engagement.  “While Cerulli believes digital platforms will play a crucial role in the future of advice, these results underscore the importance of human advisors as the core of wealth management competitive positioning,” Smith said.

“Yet despite economic uncertainty amid the revised pace of rate cuts for the year, along with uncertainty around the 2024 election, investors remain optimistic about the market.”  Dynata conducted the online survey from April 1-17 among 875 U.S. self-directed investors, investors who fully delegate investment account management to financial professionals and investors who do both. Sixty percent were male, and 40% female. The panel was broken into three levels of investable assets: less than $500,000, between $500,000 and $1 million, and more than $1 million.  Q2 Opportunities The survey explored investor views on second-quarter sector opportunities. Amid continued interest in chipmakers and artificial intelligence, technology remained the top choice this quarter, cited by 52% of respondents.  After the first three months of the year showed glimpses of recovery from 2023, 43% of investors saw opportunity in energy as oil prices rallied to multi-month highs.  The traditionally defensive health care sector secured the third spot, cited by 36% of investors — who perhaps used it as a hedge, Morgan Stanley said. Other industries in which investors saw opportunities this quarter:  Real estate: 30% Financials: 27% Utilities: 24% Communication services: 20% Industrials: 20% Consumer staples: 20% Materials: 16% Consumer discretionary: 12%