Newsdash Insight on Plan Design & Investment Strategy from PLANSPONSOR
October 19th, 2015
Benefits & Administration
Small Steps Can Create Wellness Program Success
When you are a health care insurance provider, one may expect your company to be a model for good employee health, but at one time, that wasn’t so for Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Tennessee (BCBSTN). The company acquired OnLife, a wellness company, in 2006, and began offering its services to employees. But, as Catherine Bass, director for analytics and reporting for OnLife, tells PLANSPONSOR, a bomb threat in 2008 was the jumping off point for a more comprehensive wellness offering. BCBSTN soon found it doesn’t take great strides to cut costs and improve employee health.Read more >
A Georgetown professor discussed with PLANSPONSOR his ideas for creating state-supported ‘individual DBs’ to bring workplace retirement benefits to more private-sector workers.Read more >
MOST READ ARTICLES
Compliance
Latest 401(k) Plan Forfeiture Complaint Filed Against BMO Financial
Administration
Principal CEO: Recordkeepers Should Get Creative to Enhance Services, Go Beyond Scale
Opinions
Retirement Income Stands Out as a Rare Consensus Focus for Politicians
Company Stock Can Still Be a Prudent Investment
A recent court decision put fear in defined contribution plan sponsors about offering company stock in the plan lineup, but it can still be a prudent investment if they keep in mind certain considerations.Read more >
Products, Deals & People
As part of National Save for Retirement Week, Lincoln Financial Group has introduced a retirement education and communication program. The “Let’s Go!” program is available for retirement plan sponsors to use with participants. The program includes a comprehensive suite of materials and a dedicated website with several interactive features.Read more >
Investment Product Launches for the Week
BlackRock launches impact equity funds, and Schwab reveals money market fund changes.Read more >
FingerCheck, a time and attendance software provider, has introduced new Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) tools for employers. For small to midsize businesses that employ close to 50 employees, in order to help employers keep their full-time employee count under the ACA threshold, FingerCheck provides free labor reports they can run to determine if their company qualifies as an applicable large employer by taking into consideration their full-time equivalents.Read more >
Retirement Industry People Roundup
This week brings promotions at T. Rowe Price and Wilshire Consulting, as well as third-party administrator acquisitions.Read more >
Sponsored message from BlackRock
A New Framework for DC: Getting participants’ future in focus
A new holistic framework for understanding risk across an entire DC plan.Read more >
Economic Events
THE ECONOMIC WEEK AHEAD: Tomorrow, the Census Bureau will report about housing starts for September. Thursday, the Labor Department will release its initial claims report, and the National Association of Realtors will issue a report about existing home sales for September.
Market Mirror

U.S. stock indices closed mostly higher Friday, as investors mostly focused on the latest company earnings news, the Associated Press reported. The Dow gained 74.22 points (0.43%) to finish at 17,215.97, the NASDAQ was up 16.59 points (0.34%) at 4,886.69, and the S&P 500 increased 9.25 points (0.46%) to 2,033.11. The Russell 2000 slipped 0.47 points (0.04%) to 1,162.30, and the Wilshire 5000closed 78.96 points (0.37%) higher at 21,280.38.

On the NYSE, 3.2 billion shares traded, with 1.4 advancing issues for every declining issue. On the NASDAQ, 2.7 billion shares changed hands, with a slight lead for decliners.

The price of the 10-year Treasury bond was down 5/32, increasing its yield to 2.035%. The price of the 30-year Treasury bond decreased 11/32, bringing its yield up to 2.885%.

WEEK’S WORTH: For the week ending October 16, the Dow finished 0.77% higher, the NASDAQ climbed 1.16%, and the S&P 500 gained 0.88%. The Russell 2000 finished 0.26% lower, and the Wilshire 5000 increased 0.58%.

From the Magazine
Just out of Reish: Monitoring Call Centers
Plan sponsors need to know what their service providers are saying to participants about distributions and rollovers. At the least, this is good risk management. But it may also be a fiduciary duty. Sponsors, which typically act through their plan committees, select the recordkeeper as a service provider and the call center as one of the services. As a result, plan committees have a fiduciary duty to monitor those services.Read more >
Small Talk
ON THIS DATE: In 1765, in the U.S., The Stamp Act Congress met and drew up a declaration of rights and liberties. In 1781, British General Charles Lord Cornwallis surrendered to U.S. General George Washington at Yorktown, Virginia. It was to be the last major battle of the American Revolutionary War. In 1937, “Woman’s Day” was published for the first time. In 1944, Marlon Brando made his debut in the play “I Remember Mama” on Broadway. In 1960, the United States imposed an embargo on exports to Cuba covering all commodities except medical supplies and certain food products. In 1983, the U.S. Senate approved a bill establishing a national holiday in honor of Martin Luther King, Jr.
Last week, I asked NewsDash readers, “Which candidates in the running for the Republican and Democratic nominations are you familiar with, and if you could ask the candidates one question, what would it be?” Democratic candidate Hilary Clinton is the candidate most familiar to responding readers (95.5%), followed by Republican candidates Jeb Bush, Chris Christie and Donald Trump (each selected by 93.3% of respondents). Getting both parties to work together was the top theme in the questions readers would pose to the candidates. “Are you able to answer a question with a single sentence?” is an example of some of the less agenda-related questions. After reading the questions, I learned about the Kobayashi Maru test. There was much concern expressed in comments left by responding readers about the quality of candidates who are running—“If Donald Trump wins, I will move to Canada,” one reader said—and the “mess” our government is in. However, some readers expressed pleasure with having candidates with non-political histories. Editor’s Choice goes to the reader who said, “This has been the most entertaining race I can remember. Can’t wait for the next debate!” Thank you to all who participated in our survey!Read more >
Editor’s Note: In Friday Files last week, we reported about an aunt that sued her young nephew because she broke her wrist when he jumped into her arms at a birthday party. The aunt and nephew have both appeared on television to explain that home owners’ insurance wouldn’t pay for her injuries, so to get financial help she needed to go to court. She couldn’t name the insurance company in her complaint, so she had to sue the family. The family was aware and supportive.
Share the good news with a friend! Pass the Dash along – and tell your friends/associates they can sign up for their own copy.Read more >

Editorial: Alison Cooke Mintzer alison.mintzer@strategic-i.com

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