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Roth Accounts

The DOL Rule and Why Brokers and Insurance Agents Should be Concerned

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By Mack Bekeza

Are you currently a Registered Representative or an Insurance agent? If so, you will want to keep reading!

As you may know, the Department of Labor will have new regulations in effect on April 10, 2017, which will change how Brokers and Insurance agents conduct business with retirement investors.

For starters, when dealing with retirement investors, the broker or insurance agent cannot receive variable compensation. This means that someone receiving commissions, asset based fees, 12b-1 fees, etc. must create a uniform method of compensation.

Additionally, any investment recommendations must be in the retirement investor’s best interest, meaning that the agent or broker must have a thorough understanding of the client’s overall financial picture and cannot just rely on FINRA’s suitability standards.

Finally, if you still want to receive variable forms of compensation, you must be able to comply with something called the Best Interest Contract Exemption, aka the “BICE.” And, in order to truly comply, you have to be certain that recommending a product that will pay you variable compensation is in the retirement investor’s best interest.

The major caveat with complying with the BICE is that even though the client is fully aware of how you are compensated, if he or she believes the product is not their best interest, he or she can file a lawsuit against you. In other words, you can still sell commission based products, but don’t expect the BICE to bail you out if you are sued!

So, who is considered to be a retirement investor? To make this simple, do you sell or make investment recommendations for the following accounts?

  • ERISA governed Retirement Plans (with less than $50 million)
  • Non-ERISA Retirement Plans (e.g., Keogh, Solo Plans)
  • IRAs
  • Health Savings Accounts, Archer MSAs, and Coverdell ESAs

If you fall into one of these categories, you will want to seek advice on where to go from here! If you reside in the Greater Denver Area, Castle Rock Investment Company and The Law Offices of Ed Frado, LLC are hosting an event to educate Brokers and Insurance Agents on the details of the new DOL regulation on September 20th at Maggiano’s in the Denver Tech Center. If you would like to register, click here

We hope to see you at the event!

© Castle Rock Investment Company. All rights reserved. Please share your insights with us at info@castlerockinvesting.com or via phone at 303-719-7523

In-plan Roth Rollovers: the latest topic

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Get out your red pen, folks: serious revisions to the rollover options for your plan. Today we’re looking at how you will need to revise your Plan Document in order to offer in-plan Roth rollovers and a few highlights.

In-plan Roth rollovers of otherwise non-distributable amounts are treated as eligible rollovers, meaning that no withholding applies. Since this amount is not distributable, no part of the rollover may be withheld for voluntary withholding. An employee making an in-plan Roth rollover may need to increase his or her withholding or make estimated tax payments to avoid an underpayment penalty. Concerning the rollover process, here is a critical section to know from IRS Notice 2014-74:

 

If you do a rollover to a designated Roth account in the Plan

You cannot roll over a distribution to a designated Roth account in another employer’s plan. However, you can roll the distribution over into a designated Roth account in the distributing Plan. If you roll over a payment from the Plan to a designated Roth account in the Plan, the amount of the payment rolled over (reduced by any after-tax amounts directly rolled over) will be taxed. However, the 10% additional tax on early distributions will not apply (unless you take the amount rolled over out of the designated Roth account within the 5-year period that begins on January 1 of the year of the rollover).

If you roll over the payment to a designated Roth account in the Plan, later payments from the designated Roth account that are qualified distributions will not be taxed (including earnings after the rollover)…

Remember, if you’re making revisions to your Plan Document, then Best Practices direct you to get an ERISA attorney, and make sure you’re fulfilling your fiduciary responsibility.

 

Katherine Brown is a Research Associate at Castle Rock Investment Company with a Master’s degree in Global Finance, Trade, and Economic Integration from the University of Denver. She can be reached at Katherine@castlerockinvesting.com.

Save Up to Break Stuff: Retirement Saving Should Not be Taken Lightly

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By: Katherine Brown, Research Associate, Castle Rock Investment Company

My grandmother loved to drive. After they took away her license, she enthusiastically offered the use of her 1989 Crown Victoria to anyone who was visiting her, whether they had a car of their own or not. She also purchased a motorized scooter to get around her elegant, eerily silent retirement home. Often, the only sound was the elevator music playing through the halls and the whirring of the small motor on her scooter.

My grandmother loved to drive fast. Gran’s scooter was notorious for knocking down other nursing home residents, potted living and plastic plants, and the occasional painting from a wall. Ever the charmer, she would convince the staff not to take away her precious wheels. And she always paid for the damage that she caused because her husband and children set up a generous retirement fund for her.

This chart is intended for hypothetical illustration only, and is not intended to be representative of the past or future performance of any particular investment. It assumes a 7% average annual total return with no withdrawals or distributions, and reinvesting of all dividends and capital gains. Actual rates of returns cannot be predicted and will fluctuate. It does not reflect an actual investment, nor does it account for the effects of taxes, any investment expenses or withdrawals. Returns are not guaranteed and results may vary. Investment returns cannot be predicted and will fluctuate. Investor results may be more or less.These stories aren’t possible without comfortable retirement savings. Rather than a funny family story, this could easily be a sad tale of an elderly woman who crashed into something and had to move out of her residence because the cost of damages were too high. In a worldwide Future of Retirement survey, 18% of US citizens said they would never be able to retire from all paid employment.

You don’t know where your passions will take you, or whether your spouse’s bad driving will become the stuff of family legend. Saving for retirement should not be taken lightly. Though you may not like to think about growing old, you will need an income one day when you’re no longer capable of earning one. Care for your 401(k) by saving as early as you can.

In case you can’t picture it, Merrill Lynch offers a free face aging service on their website. If you’d like to peek into the future and see what you’ll look like at 90, try it out.

 

Katherine Brown completed a Master’s degree in Global Finance, Trade, and Economic Integration from the University of Denver. Her research and writing focus on international monetary economics and central banking. She can be reached at Katherine@castlerockinvesting.com.

In-Plan Rollovers to Roth

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On Monday, September 27th, 2010, the President signed into law the Small Business Jobs Act of 2010, which permits employers to amend their 401(k) plans to allow participants to transfer an “eligible rollover distribution” (ERD) into their designated Roth account.

For 2010 only, if a participant rolls over an ERD into a designated Roth account in a 401(k) plan, he or she can include:

  1. half of the taxable amount of the rollover in 2011 gross income and half in 2012 gross income; or
  2. the entire taxable amount of the rollover in 2010 gross income.
So what’s the catch?  The plan document would have to be amended and your recordkeeper would need to update their system to track in-plan conversions.  These are both easier said than done.
In addition, the law only allows matching and profit-sharing contributions to be eligible for rollover distributions before the age of 59 1/2 by amendment.  Elective deferrals may not be distributed prior to the age of 59 1/2 while the participant is “in-service” (employed by you).
Unless your plan document provider and recordkeeper can handle these updates quickly the new law is just legislative capital designed to make elected officials look good.
Employees that are interested in taking advantage of the special 2010 Roth conversion tax treatment should consider converting an “in-service 59 1/2” eligible rollover distribution to a Roth IRA.  You simply need to verify that your plan allows in-service distributions for employees over the age of 59 1/2.