In an environment where defined benefit pension plans are seeing rising costs from declining interest rates, rising participant longevity/mortality, and rising Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation premiums, most pension plan sponsors are looking for ways to manage, or eliminate, their defined benefit liabilities and their annual pension expense.
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Every 401(k) plan is subject to certain year-end testing requirements (even plans that have adopted a safe harbor design feature). As the sponsor of your company’s 401(k) plan, you must ensure that plan contributions have not exceeded the annual limits set by federal tax law and are not discriminatory against lower paid workers.
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Last month, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) issued Final Regulations, which established rules around the Reportable Policy Sale provisions included in the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 (TCJA).
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It is no secret that retirement benefit plan cost structures have been under intense scrutiny in recent years. Across the board, plan fees have seen a marked decrease which is positive for plan participants and their retirement savings. With these fee compressions, retirement industry service providers with multiple financial services business units have been searching for alternate revenue streams to fill the void. Plan fiduciaries need to evaluate and understand what is being done with plan participant data, as well as the solicitation practices associated with these non-plan products and services.
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Plan loans are a popular feature of 401(k) and other retirement plans. Workers may be more likely to save for retirement in an employer sponsored plan if they know they can access their savings during their working years. And if they do need to do so, a plan loan enables them to restore their savings, with interest, back to their retirement plan account.
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An annual cash incentive plan can be a great motivator to drive organizational results. And it all begins with a good plan design.
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Over the past two decades, Bank Owned Life Insurance (BOLI) has shown to be a great asset for banks, but occasionally a policy group may need to be replaced with a new product. A replacement is typically executed via tax-free exchange under Internal Revenue Code Section 1035 (“1035 Exchange”). A 1035 Exchange should not be taken lightly, and there are many factors to consider before executing an exchange.
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Mid-year offers opportunity to check in with your 401(k) plan clients to see how their plans fared on mid-year testing. These test results don’t count against the plan in any way, but they are a helpful gauge of whether the plan could fail nondiscrimination testing at year end–when there are consequences for failed testing results.
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Workers who save for retirement in their employer’s 401(k) plan generally don’t have access to their savings until they change jobs or retire – unless they suffer a financial hardship.
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Newport Group helped a large conglomerate see the “big picture” of its executive compensation structure and provided a vision for long term improvements.
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