Prudential

Synesis Life, a company set up specifically to enter the bulk annuity market, has made a new appointment to its board.

Almost one and a half million pensioners live on a retirement income of less than £5,000, claims Prudential.

The annuity market must become more innovative and flexible to meet the needs of people's changing perception of retirement from a cliff-edge change to a transitional process, claims industry experts.

FINANCIAL SERVICES GROUP Prudential is in talks to sell its private equity division PPM Capital to the company's management team, The Daily Telegraph has learned.

As falling bond and gilt yields cause conventional annuity rates to continue to decrease, with-profit annuities are becoming more popular with both advisers and consumers, claims Prudential.

The bulk annuity market looks set to expand from a market dominated by just two companies, to a more competitive sector with at least four new entrants announced in as many months.

Prudential have revealed an updated product valuation service for advisers on it's extranet.

The government has a duty to make the benefits of equity release clearer to encourage more advisers to accept it, according to speakers on IFAonline TV.

SANDY CROMBIE, chief executive of Standard Life, yesterday claimed it was "patently obvious" many of the group's policyholders "had no idea how their products worked", reports The Scotsman .

PRUDENTIAL IS UNDERSTOOD to have ruled out any move on Standard Life as the Edinburgh mutual prepares for its £5bn stock-market flotation, believing that the UK market would not generate the returns to justify a big-money outlay, reports The Scotsman...