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March 17, 2010 at 08:00 PM
Participants in the fixed indexed annuity fly-in are probably visiting the offices of more than 50 senators and about 100 House members this week.
Blair O’Connor, legislative affairs committee chair at the National Association for Fixed Annuities, Milwaukee, and chairman of the new Independent Fixed Annuities Agents Council, Sterling Heights, gave that estimate in an interview today.
The fly-in attracted a total of about 100 participants.
The fly-in officially took place Tuesday, but many participants – especially those who flew in from the West Coast – are still in Washington, O’Connor says.
“We’re going to do a breakdown Monday,” O’Connor says.
O’Connor, president of Producer’s Choice Inc., Sterling Heights, Mich., an FIA wholesaler, helped lead efforts to organize the fly-in.
Fly-in participants want the House to pass H.R. 2733 and the Senate to pass S. 1389. The bills would define fixed indexed annuities as insurance products and block the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission from trying to implement Rule 151A, which would classify the products as securities.
The SEC argues that it should regulate FIA products as securities because, from the perspective of consumers, they appear to be similar to securities.
Fly-in participants argue that the products clearly are insurance products, with principal and minimum returns backed by insurance company general accounts. They also argue that defining FIA products as securities would drive up compliance costs and make the products unaffordable.
Reps. Gregory Meeks, D-N.Y., and Thomas Price, R-Ga., introduced H.R. 2733.
