Executive Compensation & Employee Benefits Associate
Baker & McKenzie
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DATAIR Employee Benefit Systems, Inc.
in IL

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My Benefits, LLC
in GA, OH

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OneAmerica Financial Partners, Inc
in IN

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Proactive Preparation for Health Reform's Employer Shared Responsibility Penalty: 2014 Decisions Will Impact 2015 Liabilities
June 18, 2014 WEBCAST
(Winstead PC)

Let's Talk ESOPs
June 19, 2014 in ID
(ESOP Association)

Qualified Health Plan (QHP) Series - “Office Hours” General Q&A
June 24, 2014 WEBCAST
(Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS))

Federally-facilitated Small Business Health Options Program (FF-SHOP) Series III - Update and Issuer Q&A
July 1, 2014 WEBCAST
(Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS))

2014 National Conference
September 15, 2014 in FL
(PSCA [Plan Sponsor Council of America])

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[Official Guidance]

IRS Fill-in VCP Submission Documents
Fillable forms include: Form 14568, Appendix C Part I: Model VCP Submission Compliance Statement; Form 14568-A, Schedule 1: Interim and Certain Discretionary Nonamender Failures; Form 14568-B, Schedule 2: Nonamender Failures (other than those to which Schedule 1 applies) and Failure to Adopt a 403(b) Plan Timely; Form 14568-C, Schedule 3: SEPs and SARSEPs; Form 14568-D, Schedule 4: SIMPLE IRAs; Form 14568-E, Schedule 5: Plan Loan Failures (Qualified Plans and 403(b) Plans); Form 14568-F, Schedule 6: Employer Eligibility Failure (401(k) and 403(b) Plans only); Form 14568-G, Schedule 7: Failure to Distribute Elective Deferrals in Excess of the Section 402(g) Limit; Form 14568-H, Schedule 8: Failure to Pay Required Minimum Distributions Timely under Section 401(a)(9); Form 14568-I, Schedule 9: Correction by Plan Amendment (in accordance with Appendix B). (Internal Revenue Service [IRS])  

[Advert.]

Boston Regional Conference, July 10-11

Sessions designed for TPAs, actuaries, attorneys and investment professionals, featuring national and regional speakers.

Plan v. Settlor Expenses under ERISA and Non-ERISA Defined Benefit and Defined Contribution Plans (PDF)
Includes a 3-page chart assigning particular expenses to one category or the other. "Expenses that 'may' be paid by the plan are administrative 'plan expenses' (the plan sponsor always has the option to pay these expenses rather than paying them from plan assets).... Expenses that 'must' be paid by the plan sponsor are known as settlor expenses. The DOL has, for a long time, taken the position that there is a class of discretionary activities which relate to the formation, rather than the management of plans. These activities are referred to as 'settlor functions' and they generally include decisions relating to the establishment, design and termination of the plan." (MassMutual)  

Application of Title IV of ERISA to Plans Covering Puerto Rico Participants: An Unofficial Update
"PBGC staff unofficially noted that the PBGC's position is that ... dual-qualified defined benefit pension plans are subject to the provisions of Title IV of ERISA, but P.R.-only qualified defined benefit pension plans are not. The PBGC staff also disclosed that if the PBGC determined that a Puerto Rico or Guam plan was not covered under Title IV of ERISA, it refunded up to six years of PBGC premiums." (Bloomberg BNA)  

The Role of Diversity in Investment Committee Effectiveness
"Although foundational research touts the potential benefits of introducing diversity to a decision-making body ... the level of importance that committee members give to diversity is quite different. In fact, the survey found that: [1] Less than one-quarter of respondents rated diversity as 'very/extremely important'; [2] More than 90% said their committee had no formal diversity policy; and [3] Only one-quarter of respondents said their committee had become more diverse over the 'past five years.'" (Vanguard)  

Target Date Strategies as a Qualified Default Investment Alternative (QDIA)
"Plan fiduciaries should understand the benefit(s) each underlying investment strategy is expected to contribute to the overall target date option in light of the prevailing market environment ... If there is no coordination among all portfolio managers involved in the decision-making process, the various securities independently selected by the numerous underlying managers may end up reflecting the broad markets in aggregate, and there may be little room for the target date option to add value versus the broad market from a security selection perspective." (Manning & Napier)  

The Pros and Cons of Target Date Funds in the Accumulation Phase
"Lifecycle or target-date funds (TDFs) are frequently criticized for not being customized or tailored to individual situations. But this is unfair, as they are meant to serve as default investment options for individuals who are otherwise unwilling or unable to put in the effort to obtain a better result. Nonetheless, the debates around TDFs provide an opportunity for advisors to make clear how they can serve their clients." (Wade Pfau, for Advisor Perspectives)  

New Demands Require New Approaches for Recordkeepers
"With 7,000 Americans turning 65 each day, retirement administrators' workloads for handling disbursements are expanding rapidly.... Meeting new fiduciary standards for the nation's key retirement programs requires providers to establish, document and follow more prudent investment policies, document compliance, and ensure the proper fiduciary training to employees and advisors." (SunGard Financial Systems)  

Millennials: Making Room for Retirement Savings
"[M]illennials can benefit the most by adopting a different view of retirement and financial planning while they're still young.... The steps they can take include beginning retirement saving early, understanding the plan, increasing deferrals over time, taking advantage of retirement savings estimate tools, appreciating the power of compound interest, resisting the temptation to tap retirement savings for other purposes (e.g., hardship distributions), and keeping plan beneficiary designations up to date." (Milliman)  

Retirement Plan Sponsors Are Very Interested in Whether or Not Their Participants Can Retire Successfully
"Two-thirds of plan sponsors measure the success of their 401(k) plan by the extent to which it gets participants on track to a successful retirement.... Two-thirds of plan sponsors expect their financial professional to be aggressive in promoting outcomes-focused retirement income planning.... Seventy-six percent of plan sponsors believe an employer match is the most effective plan feature to improve participant outcomes." (The Principal Financial Group)  

Day Trading Your 401(k)? Six Reasons to Stop Now
"[1] You're not smarter than The Street.... [2] Your gut feelings are probably wrong.... [3] There may be penalties.... [4] Volatility can work against you too.... [5] This is not a market to time.... [6] It's real money." (The Huffington Post)  

Take it or Leave it? What Older Workers Do with Their 401(k) Balances (PDF)
"[L]eaving money in the prior employer plan was the most common option, cited by 27.4 percent of respondents in 2010. Among those not already receiving benefits, an IRA rollover was the next-most common option cited (24.9 percent) by 2010 survey respondents, while withdrawals accounted for 15.6 percent and 17.5 percent of all outcomes in 2008 and 2010, respectively." (Employee Benefit Research Institute [EBRI])  

U.S. Corporate DB, DC Assets Pass $8 Trillion Mark
"U.S. corporate defined benefit and defined contribution plans had combined assets of $8.064 trillion as of March 31, up 1.1% from three months earlier and an 8.6% increase from a year earlier ... Defined benefit plan assets totaled $3.081 trillion as of March 31, up 0.4% from Dec. 31, while defined contribution plan assets totaled $4.983 trillion, up 1.6% from three months earlier." (Pensions & Investments)  

Pension Funding Index, May 2014
"The funded status deficit of the 100 largest corporate defined benefit pension plans increased by $15 billion during April ... The $258 billion deficit at the end of April is primarily due to a drop in the benchmark corporate bond interest rates used to value pension liabilities. Asset improvements helped to partially offset the full extent of liability increases in April. As of April 30, the funded ratio fell to 84.7%, down from 85.3% at the end of March." (Milliman)  

Little Change in May 2014 Pension Index
"The recent pattern of interest rate declines paired with mildly positive equity returns continued in May. Liability values increased slightly more than assets, and thus the Towers Watson Pension Index dropped 0.1% for the month to 74.2." (Towers Watson)  

Bills Proposed to Permit More Alternative Investments by New York Public Pension Funds
"The bills, introduced in the state Senate and state Assembly, would amend the so-called basket clause, allowing public pension funds to devote as much as 35% of allocations outside the 'legal list' rather than the existing 25%.... The basket clause has been amended several times since 1982 when the allocation to alternative investments was first set at 5%[.]" (Pensions & Investments)  

[Opinion]

It's Time to Get Rid of Indirect Compensation in Small Business Retirement Plans
"Indirect compensation in the 1980s not only made sense, it was the most efficient means of handling plan services in an era when investing was an expensive proposition.... Today, access to information and transparency are better than ever before. Seriously. So much has changed, except for ... indirect compensation. There is no longer a market efficiency argument for its existence." (Employee Fiduciary)  

[Opinion]

The Great Discount Rate Flip-Flop
"In signing on to the city's bankruptcy plan, Detroit's two retirement systems have agreed to lower their discount rates to 6.75% from around 8%.... Detroit's Wall Street creditors ... argue that lowering the rate was all part of a populist scheme hatched by Emergency Manager Kevyn Orr to exaggerate the size of his proposed pension cuts. Orr's actuarial conservatism fails bankruptcy's 'unfair discrimination' test, which requires that creditors with equally strong claims to repayment get repaid at roughly equal rates." (Steve Eide, in Public Sector Inc.)  

GreatBanc Trust Finalizes Acquisition of North Star Trust Company
GreatBanc Trust Company

Consumer-Directed Health Care Solutions Leader ConnectYourCare Bolsters its Board of Directors with Health Care and Technology Leaders
ConnectYourCare

NAGDCA RFP - Research Paper on the Future of Retirement
National Association of Government Defined Contribution Administrators

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