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Retirement
Lump Sum Payouts from Pension Plans
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The IRS recently announced that it will allow plan sponsors to pay out pensions as a lump sum to plan participants. In this video BMO Global Asset Management discusses what considerations should be made by plan sponsors and plan participants before choosing lump sum as an option.
Fixed Income Insights
May 2020 Fixed Income Market Update
This piece is approved to use with clients.
In our view, the markets feel much healthier at the end of April than a month ago, but underappreciated in the improved sentiment is not only the scale of March policy action, but its continuation into April. Actions announced in April would ordinarily have remained in headlines and discussion for weeks, but the nearly half trillion dollar U.S. fiscal stimulus package has been treated almost as a footnote to its much larger cousin in March. Similarly, Fed and other central banks not only continued to implement the massive programs initiated last month, but significantly expanded on them.
Fixed Income Insights
Municipal Yields Have Converged
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Over the past several weeks, yields between short- and intermediate-term Municipal Bonds have converged. This may be an opportunity for investors to significantly reduce interest rate risk while sacrificing minimal income since shorter-term bonds typically have less sensitivity to rates.
Fixed Income Insights
Neither bulls nor bears last forever
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While bull markets don’t last forever, neither do bear markets. Since 1928, the strength and duration of S&P 500® bull markets has meaningfully outweighed that of bear markets.
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Goals/Needs-Based Investing
It’s personal: The growing need for financial wellness programs
78% of Americans are living paycheck to paycheck, 43% of student loan borrowers are not making payments and nearly half of all employees can’t cover a $400 emergency. In an effort to help employees understand and improve their personal financial health, many plan sponsors and their advisors are turning to workplace financial wellness programs. Phyllis Klein is a senior director at Captrust Financial Advisors, a firm that specializes in institutional advisory work. In this episode, Phyllis discusses the benefits and challenges of helping employers implement financial wellness programs for their employees.
Fixed Income Insights
Did the Fed just go Minority Report?
We believe the Fed is taking a risk — one we hope works — in shifting from reactive to preemptive monetary policy. It was not that long ago that the Fed was more forthright about the uncertainty inherent in economic forecasting as Chairman Powell used the analogy of walking into a dark room and slowing down to avoid furniture as an analogy for the Fed’s situation. Today, they seem more certain that they know the future and aim to alter it.
Goals/Needs-Based Investing
Risk management: Life insurance
Talking about life insurance as part of a financial plan isn’t always easy, but it is important. What steps can you take to ensure these difficult conversations make it into your client’s financial plan?
Portfolio Construction Insights
Growth vs. value? There’s a place for both
Historically, growth and value have behaved differently across varying market environments, suggesting that investors may benefit from having a strategic allocation to both styles of investing. We build a case for why there’s a place for both in a portfolio.
Goals/Needs-Based Investing
Managing wealth for same-sex couples
Of course, working with same-sex clients is largely no different than working with any other group of clients, but in order to properly serve this community, advisors should understand the mindset, key issues, and changing laws and policies that directly impact their money and wealth.
Retirement
Creating more precision with life expectancy planning
As life expectancy numbers continue to increase, the need for more careful and more precise financial planning for retirement has increased with it. A startup called Genivity, one of the winners of BMO's 1871 FinTech partnership program in 2017, is helping financial advisors have better conversations with their clients by incorporating health history insights into the financial planning process.
Retirement
To claim or not to claim? The Social Security question
Determining a Social Security strategy can be one of the most complicated processes that people across the U.S. face as they reach retirement. Learn the ins and outs of claiming Social Security and the role you can play in the process as a financial advisor.
Retirement
Health savings accounts: A strategic retirement tool?
With the cost of healthcare steadily rising across America, planning for this expense has become a focal point in many financial plans. Learn how investors and their advisors can turn to health savings accounts, and their tax benefits to address the specific cost in retirement.