Employee Benefits Security Administration October 7, 2008 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

This document contains a final rule that implements the content requirements for the written cross-trading policies and procedures required under section 408(b)(19)(H) of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA or the Act). Section 611(g) of the Pension Protection Act of 2006, Public Law No. 109-280, 120 Stat. 780, 972, amended section 408(b) of ERISA by adding a new subsection (19) that exempts the purchase and sale of a security between a plan and any other account managed by the same investment manager if certain conditions are satisfied. Among other requirements, section 408(b)(19)(H) stipulates that the investment manager must adopt, and effect cross-trades in accordance with, written cross- trading policies and procedures that are fair and equitable to all accounts participating in the cross-trading program. This final rule affects employee benefit plans, investment managers, plan fiduciaries and plan participants and beneficiaries.

This document amends PTE 2006-06 (71 FR 20856, Apr. 21, 2006), a prohibited transaction class exemption issued under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA). Among other things, PTE 2006-06 permits a ``qualified termination administrator'' (QTA) of an individual account plan that has been abandoned by its sponsoring employer to select itself to provide services to the plan in connection with the plan's termination, and to pay itself fees for those services. In response to changes to the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 (the Code) enacted as part of the Pension Protection Act (PPA) of 2006, PTE 2006- 06 is amended to require, as a condition of relief under the exemption, that benefits for a missing, designated nonspouse beneficiary be directly rolled over into an inherited individual retirement plan that fully complies with Code requirements. This amendment also conforms to the Department's final rule amending regulations concerning the Termination of Abandoned Individual Account Plans at 29 CFR 2578.1 (the QTA Regulation), and the Safe Harbor for Distributions from Terminated Individual Account Plans at 29 CFR 2550.404a-3 (the Safe Harbor Regulation), which appears elsewhere in this issue of the Federal Register. The amendment to the class exemption affects plans, participants and beneficiaries of such plans and certain persons engaging in such transactions.

This document contains a final rule amending regulations under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 that provide guidance and a fiduciary safe harbor for the distribution of benefits on behalf of participants or beneficiaries in terminated and abandoned individual account plans. The Department is amending these regulations to reflect changes enacted as part of the Pension Protection Act of 2006 to the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 (the Code), under which a distribution of a deceased plan participant's benefit from an eligible retirement plan may be directly transferred to an individual retirement plan established on behalf of the designated nonspouse beneficiary of such participant. Specifically, the amended regulations require as a condition of relief under the fiduciary safe harbor that benefits for a missing, designated nonspouse beneficiary be directly rolled over to an individual retirement plan that fully complies with Code requirements. This final rule will affect fiduciaries, plan service providers, and participants and beneficiaries of individual account pension plans.