Entries by lisa

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PPG Industries Enters the Pension De-risking Arena

PPG Industries, a Fortune 200 global manufacturer of paints, coatings and optical products has entered into agreements with Metropolitan Life Insurance Company and Massachusetts Mutual Life Insurance Company to provide annuity benefits to 13,400 retirees removed from PPG’s defined benefit pension plans.  In what appear to be  annuity “lift-out’s” PPG has purchased group annuity contracts […]

Public Hearing on pension derisking legislation in Connecticut

On Thursday, March 3, 2016 the Insurance and Real Estate Committee of the Connecticut General Assembly will hold a public hearing on proposed legislation regarding protections for retirees in pension derisking transfers.  The hearing will be held at 1:00 p.m. in the Legislative Office Building at 300 Capitol Avenue, Hartford, CT 06106.  The full text […]

Additional Pension Derisking Legislation Pending in Connecticut!

ProtectSeniors.org has done it again!  Raised Bill No. 5455 entitled “An Act Concerning the Purchase of An Annuity to Fund Pension Benefits” has been introduced in the Connecticut legislature.  The proposed legislation requires disclosures to retirees impacted by pension derisking transfers and limits subsequent transfers of the annuity contract to “an entity that maintains a rating […]

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New Hampshire Ups Guaranty Association Coverage

New Hampshire has increased guaranty association coverage for annuity contracts  from $100,000 to $250,000.  While this is still $250,000 less than the coverage offered by New York, Connecticut, New Jersey and Washington, it puts New Hampshire in line with the coverage offered by thirty-seven other states. This increase in coverage is very important to retirees […]

Maryland A.G. seeks information on factoring transactions

The Maryland Attorney General, Brian Frosh, has asked two attorneys involved in the structured settlement factoring industry, Anuj Sud and Charles Smith, to divulge records relating to their participation with Access Funding’s acquisition of over $28,000,000 of future payments from “overwhelmingly poor” Baltimore residents who were “cognitively impaired as a result of lead poisoning. Unlike many […]

ProtectSeniors.org Op-ed by Chairman Bill Jones

An excellent op-ed was published by Fort Worth’s Star-Telegram in late October, written by C. William Jones, the Chairman of ProtectSeniors.org.  The piece focused on the pension de-risking crisis facing today’s retirees.  Plano, Texas based J.C. Penney was the latest company to join the de-risking bandwagon, offering both lump-sum buyouts and transferring it pension obligations to […]

Cleveland Plain Dealer – Pension De-Risking

Edward Stone’s guest column – reprinted below – appeared in the Sunday, October 4, 2015 edition of Cleveland’s “The Plain Dealer.” “Euclid-based Lincoln Electric Co. has become the latest company to join the pension de-risking bandwagon. By offloading its retirees’ pension obligations through the purchase of a group annuity contract from The Principal Financial Group, as of Nov, 1, […]

Deceased NFL Players test Positive for CTE

Chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) has been identified in 96% of the deceased NFL players that have been examined by researchers with the Department of Veterans Affairs and Boston University. Signs of CTE can be identified in living persons using brain scans, but as yet the disease can only be positively identified posthumously. Researchers believe that CTE comes […]

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J.C . Penney Announces Pension De-Risking Annuity Purchase

Today,  J.C. Penney announced that it would continue its pension de-risking efforts by purchasing a group annuity contract from The Prudential Insurance Company of America. While exact numbers of retirees affected and the terms of the agreement have yet to be released, it appears that this pension de-risking transfer is an annuity “lift-out” and the […]