The Department of Labor re-proposed regulations last week focused on who could provide investment advice to 401(k) plan participants. These regulations, which grew out of the Pension Protection Act’s provision on the subject, have been extremely contentious. The battle is over whether plan providers who provide such advice should be allowed to continue to do so if their advice could be tainted by virtue of their profiting from recommendations made to participants.

Regulations previously issued by the DOL under the Bush Administration were withdrawn before being finalized almost immediately following President Obama taking office. These new regulations take a much harder line on the potentially conflicted firms, effectively making it impossible for certain financial services organizations to provide advice. The new regulations are slated to take effect in May, but the fighting between those for and those against has already reached a fevered pitch.

To view the DOL's Fact Sheet on the proposed regulations, please click on the PDF or Publisher's links to the right.