In 2001 and 2002, insurance companies began introducing the guaranteed withdrawal benefit, giving VA owners a guaranteed income stream. The current bear market is forcing insurance companies to cut benefits and to...
Proposed legislation aimed at restricting the use of independent contractors for labor and tax purposes is back on the federal to do list. Independent broker/dealer executives are worried the legislation could put...
Will the Public-Private Investment Program (PPIF) announced today by Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner work or won’t it? If you listen to former Treasury Secretary Paulson’s chief of staff, the PPIF won&...
What should you do when you want someone else’s money? If you’re Congress, you tax the heck out of them until they’ve got close to nothing left. Last week, the House approved a 90 percent tax on...
This week, Wall Street is bearish on compensation. Perhaps the most alarming (read hilarious) bit of news was a veritable death sentence for AIG executives issued Monday by Iowa Senator Charles “Chuck”...
The current financial regulatory apparatus, all agree (at last), is outdated, having been cobbled together over the decades, beginning after the Great Crash of 1929. Setting aside whether a Glass-Steagall-type law...
Ah, nevermind about those asset sales. AIG is no longer planning on selling businesses to pay back the government’s $85 billion loan, Bloomberg reports. Instead the company may give stakes in some businesses...
On Friday, hours after Wachovia Securities told managers that the firm’s financial advisors would not receive any retention bonus, Smith Barney and Morgan Stanley reps got some good news: Some extra cash is on...
In the 18th century there might have been a public flogging or a stint in the town square's pillory, but would the pre-credit-crunch world have condemned Wall Street leaders and members of Congress to the gallows?
