The world of life insurance presents what feels like a never-ending array of products and choices. One of these emerging product structures, indexed universal life insurance (indexed UL), may be heavily marketed to your high-net-worth clients...

You own individual retirement account and non-IRA assets. You want a certain amount of your estate to pass to charity, and you want the charitable gift to be as tax efficient as possible to maximize the balance that will pass to your children (or...

Four recent court decisions shed some new light on certain situations clients may encounter in dealing with creditors' claims on individual retirement accounts and employer sponsored tax-qualified retirement benefits. Three of those were...

Beginning in 2010, individuals are allowed to convert or roll over certain distributions from retirement plans and IRAs to Roth IRAs regardless of their modified adjusted gross income. Complex rules apply. Here are some key points about how the...

As Thomas C. Foster points out in his companion piece to this article (see p. 54), the law governing the protection of inherited individual retirement accounts from creditors is uncertain at best. The statutes and court interpretations vary from...

Well Georgia Sam he had a bloody noseWelfare Department they wouldn't give him no clothesHe asked poor Howard where can I goHoward said there's only one place I knowSam said tell me quick man I got to runOl' Howard just pointed with his gunAnd...

Roth individual retirement accounts offer the enticing benefits of tax-free growth and the ability to make withdrawals during retirement when certain conditions are met.1 But prior to this year, there was an income restriction on who could convert...

Somewhere in a bleak house in Washington, D.C.a plot exists. The conspirators are working against a favorite planning tool, the grantor retained annuity trust (GRAT). Bill after bill has been born to limit the flexibility and power of the GRAT.1...