New Athene Annuity Comes With Income Feature Built-In
June 27, 2018 by Cyril Tuohy
Athene’s new Agility index annuity’s lifetime income and enhanced death benefit features come without a separate product fee.
And that makes it an unusual product in today’s annuity marketplace.
Lifetime income features and more generous death benefits are typically offered as optional riders that usually come at an extra cost.
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Only 14 index annuities – 3 percent – of all index annuities on the market have no separate fee for a lifetime withdrawal benefit feature, said Sheryl J. Moore, president and CEO of Moore Market Intelligence and Wink, publisher of Wink’s Sales & Market Report.
With recent reserving changes, pricing guaranteed lifetime income benefits has become more difficult, which may explain why so few index annuities come with lifetime income features included, Moore said.
More Built-In Features On The Way?
But that could change.
“Athene is a market leader, and if sales of Agility do well, it very well could signal the end of this ‘shortage,’ as companies are always looking to duplicate top-selling products,” Moore said.
North American’s Prime Path, an index annuity with no separate lifetime income withdrawal benefit fee, is selling very well since it entered the market in January 2016, Moore said.
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Athene USA was the No. 2 seller of index annuities in the market at the end of the first quarter with $1.2 billion in sales, according to Wink.
First quarter index annuity sales rose 10 percent to $14.2 billion compared to the year-ago period, Wink reported.
