Consumers' inflation fears helped sales of individual annuities that offer income growth potential in the third quarter and hurt sales of other individual annuities.
Wink has reported the details in a summary of results from its latest annuity issuer survey.
Overall sales of individual deferred annuities climbed 10% between the third quarter of 2020 and the third quarter of 2021, to $60 billion.
Sales of both types of variable annuities that Wink tracks climbed more than 25%. Sales of non-variable indexed annuity contracts — which promise to protect the holder's account value but have features that can increase the crediting rate — also climbed more than 25%.
Sales of traditional fixed annuities and of multi-year guaranteed annuity contracts, which pay rates that stay fixed through the course of two or more years, fell more than 25%.
Wink based the new annuity sales figures on data from 14 index-linked variable annuity issuers, 48 variable annuity issuers, 57 traditional fixed annuity issuers and 80 multi-year guaranteed annuity (MYGA) issuers.
Here's a look at how sales of some of the types of annuities Wink tracks changed between the fourth quarter of 2020 and the fourth quarter of 2021:
- Index-linked variable annuity contracts: $9.1 billion (up 46%).
- Traditional variable annuities: $22 billion (up 27%).
- Indexed annuities filed as non-variable contracts: $17 billion (up 26%).
- Traditional fixed annuities: $361 million (down 26%).
- Multi-year guaranteed annuity contracts: $22 billion (down 31%)
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