CFO Magazine Article About Pension De-Risking

In case you missed the launch of "Applied to Pensions, Risk is a Four-Letter Word" by Dr. Susan Mangiero and ERISA attorney Nancy Ross (CFO Magazine, November 8, 2012), experts conclude that Chief Financial Officers need to do their homework before entering into a particular deal. "Beyond the obvious number-crunching needed to vet what's often a large dollar transaction, the decision to de-risk should minimally include:

• A thorough evaluation of the financial, operational, and legal strength of the annuity provider as required by the U.S. Department of Labor Interpretative Bulletin 95-1.
• Independent pricing of any hard-to-value assets that will be contributed as part of a de-risking deal.
• Economic assessment of opportunity costs in a low interest rate environment and whether it is better to delay a transaction or close immediately.
• Review of vendor and counterparty contracts that may need to be unwound in the event of a full transfer of pension assets and liabilities to a third party.
• Review of direct and indirect fee amounts to be paid by a plan sponsor as the result of a de-risking transaction.
• Assessment of litigation risk associated with plan participants asserting that they've been unfairly treated as the result of a pension de-risking arrangement.
• Creation of a strategic communications action plan to ensure that plan participants, shareholders, and other relevant constituencies are provided with adequate information."

In a related commentary, ERISA Stephen Rosenberg describes the chaos in the defined benefit plan market that continues to give plan sponsors pause about staying with the status quo. Click to read "On Getting Out of the Pension Business."

Source: http://feeds.lexblog.com/~r/PensionRiskMatters/~3/zCXjeOc-xcE/

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