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Ongoing tax shifts, new policies and ideas are proving tough for advisors and investors to keep up with, given their short- and long-term impacts. Along with some IRS updates, President Joe Biden, Sen. Bernie Sanders and Sen. Elizabeth Warren have been discussing their tax ideas and proposing legislation — which advisors, tax experts and others are hotly debating.
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The economy is reopening and growing, leading to concerns over inflation and its implications for consumers and investors. Bond investor/expert Jeffrey Gundlach sees it hitting 4% soon, for example. Economist Gary Shilling concedes that consumer spending will increase but doesn’t expect the “huge burst” of spending that some experts do; many workers will continue to spend less as they keep working from home.
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The insurance industry continues to undergo incredibly deep and rapid change. On March 8, Apollo Global Management moved to gain full control over life insurer Athene Holding Ltd., a large life insurer through a stock swap valuing Athene at $11 billion. Two weeks later, former SEC Chairman Jay Clayton was named nonexecutive board chair of Apollo, and Marc Rowan assumed the role of CEO; they took over from Leon Black, who reportedly resigned due to inquiries into his ties with the now-deceased Jeffrey Epstein. Also in late March, Wilton Re — a reinsurer owned by the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board — agreed to acquire Allstate Life Insurance Company of New York from The Allstate Corp.
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Though some large financial firms have found ways to grow their brands and add products in the pandemic (like BlackRock and Schwab), others are struggling to reinvigorate their businesses. Wells Fargo, for instance, continues to restructure operations; it said in March that it will rebrand its ultra-high net worth business, Abbot Downing, and merge it into Wells Fargo Private Bank. This comes on the heels of a reduction in the number of its private client group regions from 12 to eight, as well as the announced $2.1 billion sale of its asset management unit (with $603 billion in assets) to private equity firms GTCR and Reverence Capital.
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