https://www.plansponsor.com/tibble-vs-edison-plaintiffs-win-the-latest-decision-in-district-court/ The latest ruling in Tibble vs. Edison comes out of the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California, applying the now-famous “distinct duty to monitor” standard set forth by the U.S. Supreme Court on an appeal of the very same litigation. By way of background, the pioneering lawsuit has played out over the last full decade, filed first in the California district c

With the focus on 401k and 403b lawsuits, it may be time for employers sponsoring a corporate retirement plan to get out of the line of fire by eliminating revenue sharing altogether. And if you think that these lawsuits are going away anytime soon, think again – a major 401k plaintiff’s law firm has issued a press release aimed at participants in plans using Financial Engines as their managed account provider inviting them to join class action lawsuits. So how can plan spons

Rules and regulations exist to let us know what behaviors we should expect from the people we do business with. Sometimes, good sense or social convention overtake these rules — and they don’t matter so much. Just about everyone wears seat-belts these days (we all know how much they improve our odds of survival in an accident); the ranks of underage smokers have plummeted (it’s no longer cool). Once the toothpaste is out of the tube, as they say, there’s no cramming it back i

Herbert Whitehouse was one of the first in the U.S. to suggest workers use a 401(k). His hope in 1981 was that the retirement-savings plan would supplement a company pension that guaranteed payouts for life. Thirty-five years later, the former Johnson & Johnson human-resources executive has misgivings about what he helped start. What Mr. Whitehouse and other proponents didn’t anticipate was that the tax-deferred savings tool would largely replace pensions as big employers loo

The U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) has filed a proposed order of dismissal of a lawsuit in which it alleged a government contractor failed to make required contributions to its 401(k) plan. B.C. Inc. restored to the plan unremitted employer contributions, with lost earnings, totaling approximately $149,904. The DOL filed a complaint earlier this year alleging that Tarry Bratton, B.C. Inc. and the B.C. Inc. 401(k) Profit Sharing Plan violated the Employee Retirement Income Sec

Participants in the Emerald Coast Eye Institute (ECEI) 401(k) plan have filed a lawsuit alleging that the company and its founder Samuel Poppell breached their fiduciary duties of prudence under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) by not properly diversifying investments. Poppell selected and controlled investments in the plan, and plan participants did not have authority to choose how their assets were invested. According to the complaint, he chose to signifi

In a year when the word “fiduciary” has been tossed around like an unmoored ship in a hurricane, it's perhaps not surprising that, for the first time, 401(k) plan sponsors are saying concern over fiduciary duty is the top reason they choose a plan adviser, according to a new Fidelity Investmentssurvey. A Labor Department regulation, known as the fiduciary rule, coming into effect next year will raise investment-advice standards in retirement accounts such as 401(k)s, and plan

After years of political battles, the Department of Labor (DOL) recently issued the highly anticipated final fiduciary rule. As expected, the final rule requires all financial advisors (including broker-dealers, registered investment advisors and insurance agents) to put their clients’ best interests before their own profits when they give retirement investment advice. The final rule applies when advising retirement plans (ERISA and non-ERISA plans) and individual retirement

Collective investment trusts have been capturing lots of attention and assets lately. CITs offer retirement-plan fiduciaries an attractive, generally lower-cost alternative to mutual funds. Assets invested in these vehicles have grown from about $900 billion in 2008 to over $1.5 trillion at the end of 2014, according to Pensions & Investments data. The low-cost dimension of CITs has also caught the attention of famed litigator Jerry Schlichter, of Schlichter Bogard & Denton.

April 8, the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) published in the Federal Register its long-awaited—and highly controversial—final rule to address conflicts of interest in retirement advice by applying the so-called fiduciary standard to those who provide investment advice to sponsors and participants in 401(k)-type workplace retirement plans and individual retirement accounts (IRAs). The rule had been made public two days earlier. The rule “affects how investment advice is provid