Barron’s, one of America’s premier financial magazines, recently published its fourth annual review of “The Best 50 Annuities” which reveals 50 carefully selected annuities and compares and contrasts the primary income annuity alternatives, including variable annuities, deferred income annuities, immediate income annuities and of course fixed index annuities.

Now CreativeOne is giving you exclusive access to this article for a limited time. As evident in the article, fixed indexed annuities are excellent vehicles for delivering higher guaranteed lifetime income benefits, equal to or superior to many variable annuities now used for lifetime income protection. The article demonstrates that many variable annuity clients may be very well served to consider using both a fixed index annuity with their usual retirement income solution.

While all annuity carriers are challenged by the low interest rate environment, fixed indexed annuities continue to deliver very competitive guaranteed lifetime income payout amounts. Index annuities do not have these direct investment market risks to premium value and can also be used as a separate asset class alternative to bonds and other fixed income options. Barron’s survey includes annuity carriers with ratings of “A-” and higher by A.M. Best.

With higher costs of variable annuity guaranteed lifetime withdrawal benefits (GLWBs) today and the changes in the amounts of those benefits, variable annuities likely will require even higher investment performance today in order to match the higher fixed income annuity GLWB payment amounts. While variable annuities may provide higher market-based performance potential, why not place some of those income-goal client assets in a fixed indexed annuity?

Barron’s cover story article features a relatively new annuity type – a deferred income annuity (DIA). CreativeOne can provide you with information on DIAs through our “SPIA Solutions”web-based quote system. However, before you sell a DIA we suggest you may want to look at a fixed indexed or fixed interest annuity with a GLWB rider. You might determine index or fixed products with GLWBs are still what your client’s desire and will purchase.

Access  Barron’s “The 50 Top Annuities” »

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