Background

Sheryl J. Moore is more than an expert in the Indexed Annuity and Indexed UL markets, she is an advocate. After years of working in a lucrative product development position for an insurance home office, she decided to make a change. She left the comfort and safety of her corporate job to start a company specializing in the once-niche Indexed Annuity and Index UL markets. Her belief in the story of indexed insurance products was so strong that she took the risk of starting a consulting firm, and is now an independent market research analyst. This change allowed her the ability to spread the word about the value proposition of ‘safety of principal combined with limited index-linked interest.’ Neither Sheryl J. Moore nor Advantage Group Associates, Inc. sell or endorse any company or financial product.

Legislative Work

Sheryl J. Moore is a top authority on the 10/10 Rule. This desk drawer legislation relating to Standard Non-Forfeiture Laws (SNFL) has spread like wildfire since 2005. The rule ensures that adopting state insurance divisions will not approve annuity products exceeding a 10-year surrender charge and a first-year surrender penalty of 10%. (This largely inhibits the availability of insurance companies to develop products with stronger rates, bonuses, and compensation.) Since the inception of the Interstate Insurance Product Regulation Commission (IIPRC), multiple states have adopted the anti-competitive 10/10 legislation in the name of “consumer advocacy.” Sheryl’s research and grassroots efforts have resulted in states foregoing 10/10 as well as the bypassing of a controversial 5/5 mandate in the state of Florida.

Ms. Moore has also led the fight against Indexed Annuities being regulated as securities through her research and grassroots efforts in support of S 1389 (Senate bill) and HR 2733 (House bill), effectively known as the “Indexed Annuities and Insurance Products Classification Act of 2009.” Specifically, many have credited her state-specific economic impact studies as the ammunition necessary to gain additional co-sponsors on these invaluable Congressional bills.

Media Relations Work

Sheryl has worked diligently to educate the media about indexed insurance products. She has extensive media contacts that she regularly uses to promote positive press on the indexed industry. Her firm distributes press releases on at least a quarterly basis, providing financial services media firms with accurate, up-to-date information on indexed insurance products.

More importantly, Ms. Moore has fostered relationships with the media, so that they will feel comfortable coming to her firm for information on IAs and IULs. This has dramatically reduced the incidence of inaccurate media on indexed products in the public domain. She openly offers any reporter or media firm to contact her when they need information on Indexed Annuities or Indexed UL.

Perhaps most importantly, Moore herself has responded to every negative/inaccurate article on Indexed Annuities for years. Long the naughty step-child of the insurance industry, Indexed Annuities have a high incidence of targeted misreporting. She realized when regulators were citing inaccurate data from media giants, that the only way to stop the bad information was to attack it head-on. Shockingly, even the “respectable” news sources are involved in the misleading reporting. Ms. Moore once corrected a Wall Street news giant on 26 inaccuracies they made in a single article on Indexed Annuities! Most recently, Ms. Moore started the “Setting It Straight” campaign, where she makes her rebuttals to these misleading articles available to her website subscribers. This puts them in a proactive position to handle questions on negative publicity from their distributors and clients. At one time, these misleading articles were as frequent as eight per week. Now, they occur less than on a monthly basis. To access these misleading articles and Ms. Moore’s rebuttals, see Negative Media.

For years, Sheryl Moore has worked to educate the insurance industry on the Indexed Annuity and Indexed UL markets through a variety of forums. Her research and articles have been featured in industry trade publications and resources such as:

• Agent’s Sales Journal
• BankInsurance.com
• Best’s Review
• BestWire
• Broker World
• The Des Moines Business Record
• The Des Moines Register
• Ignites
• Insurance Broadcasting
• InsuranceNewsNet.com
• Insurance News Net Magazine
• Investment News
• Life Insurance Selling
• National Underwriter (online)
• The New York Times
• Senior Market Advisor
• Wall Street Journal

Regulatory Work

Since starting her company in 2005, Ms. Moore has educated thousands of insurance regulators on the realities of the Indexed Annuity (IA) and Indexed Universal Life (IUL) markets. She has travelled to numerous state insurance divisions, at her own expense, to ensure that they are up-to-date on how indexed insurance products truly work. After years of experience, she has found that regulators are often prone to being influenced by negative media in the insurance market. Her efforts ensure that these policy-makers know vital statistics about these products. Useful statistics include the following data on IAs (as of 3Q2009):

• The average surrender charge for indexed annuities is ten years
• The average first-year surrender penalty for indexed annuities is 10.61% (and lower for older-age annuitants)
• The average street level for indexed annuities is a mere one-time 6.43%
• Two-tiered annuity sales account for less than 2% of indexed annuity sales

Ms. Moore’s research has been invaluable in dealing with the question of Indexed Annuities’ securities status. She prepared the insurance industry and assisted broker dealers (B/Ds) when the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) issued their Notice to Members 05-50. No single individual has fought harder in opposition to the Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) Rule 151A. Moore made her services available pro bono to every insurance company, marketing organization, and agent in the insurance industry, in preparation of their comments opposing the Proposed Rule 151A. Her passion is undeniably evident in her personal comment against the rule which suggests that Indexed Annuities are securities. Her desire to keep the industry fighting against the rule is apparent through her 151A files which provide every article, document, blog, and piece of documentation relevant to the rule at the public’s disposal. Sheryl believes that the matter of insurance regulation should be left to the individual state regulators, not the SEC.

It was the work of Ms. Moore’s firm that dispelled the myth that Indexed Annuities have unmanageable complaint levels. She was able to provide the SEC and other regulators with documentation showing that complaints on Indexed Annuities have never really been problematic. Her data provides evidence that these complaints have dropped steadily over the past few years and average less than four complaints per insurance company, annually. This data has been paramount in the fight against 151A.

Sheryl has long-fought for additional protections in the Indexed UL market. She has consistently provided warning to regulators that hyperfunding, equity harvesting, and over-illustrating will make IUL the target of the next industry class action lawsuit. She has fought for suitability standards in the market and standardization in the use of IUL illustrated rates.

Ms. Moore regularly assists the National Association of Insurance Commissioners (NAIC) in their work and understanding of indexed insurance products. She has provided documentation and presentations to assist the organization in product illustrations, continuing education, complaints, suitability, and product marketing. Most recently, Ms. Moore rewrote the Indexed Annuity Consumer’s Buyers Guide, an NAIC resource that was more than a decade old. She thought it important to accurately reflect the market and products that are currently available by updating a consumer resource that is frequently used as a point-of-reference and issued with every indexed annuity sold today.

More than 60% of Sheryl J. Moore’s work day is spent providing pro bono advocacy work to the Indexed Annuity and Indexed Life industries. This is why YOUR SUPPORT of Advantage Group Associates, Inc., www.annuityspecs.com and www.lifespecs.com is so important!