Registered index-linked annuities (RILAs) are increasingly popular equity-based retirement savings products offered by US life insurance companies. They combine features of fixed-index annuities and traditional variable annuities (TVAs), offering investors equity exposure with downside protection in a tax-deferred setting. This article introduces RILAs to the academic literature by describing the products' key features, developing a general pricing model, and deriving the providers' hedging strategy by decomposing their liabilities into short-term European options. Numerical illustrations show that RILAs offer investors similar risk profiles (in the long run) as TVAs with maturity guarantees, and that many products currently sold appear to be priced quite favorably for investors. For providers, RILAs may be a preferable alternative or complement to TVAs as they greatly simplify the management of the embedded equity risk and can naturally reduce the TVA capital requirements. These features position RILAs as a viable long-term solution for this product space.

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现在是 RILA 时间：注册指数挂钩年金简介

注册指数挂钩年金(RILA) 是美国人寿保险公司提供的越来越受欢迎的基于股权的退休储蓄产品。它们结合了固定指数年金和传统可变年金 (TVA) 的特点，在税收递延的情况下为投资者提供股票风险敞口和下行保护。本文通过描述产品的主要特征、开发通用定价模型以及通过将供应商的负债分解为短期欧式期权来推导供应商的对冲策略，将 RILA 引入学术文献。数值说明显示，RILA 为投资者提供了与具有到期保证的 TVA 相似的风险概况（从长远来看），而且目前出售的许多产品的定价似乎对投资者来说相当优惠。对于供应商，RILA 可能是 TVA 的一个更可取的替代方案或补充，因为它们大大简化了嵌入股权风险的管理，并且自然可以降低 TVA 的资本要求。这些特性将 RILA 定位为该产品领域可行的长期解决方案。