(New York)

Annuities have been doing very well ever since the pandemic began, and the reasons make total sense: high volatility and ultra-low rates which have rendered bonds a very poor source for retirement income. With that in mind, it is no wonder that protection-focused annuities have been seeing heightened sales. 2020 actually saw a significantly higher volume of protection-focused annuities sales than 2019, despite the fact that overall wealth and liquidity fell considerably at the start of the pandemic. The big driver of demand was the huge fall stock indexes experienced early in the pandemic.

FINSUM: This makes a lot of sense as a huge percentage of Americans are approaching retirement and 2020’s market gave them a terrible fright. We expect this trend to continue.