Allianz MasterDex Plus is a flexible premium deferred fixed index annuity. It can offer you guarantees while it helps you reach your financial goals.
With Allianz MasterDex Plus:
- Each year, you may receive indexed interest based on changes in a market index, subject to a cap or spread.
- Any indexed interest is locked in once a year, and can never be lost due to market index declines.
- After seven years you can take your annuity’s full accumulation value.
A fixed index annuity from Allianz can be a valuable asset.
A prudent plan shouldn’t rely solely on future Social Security to pay for an individual’s retirement years.
One way to accumulate additional assets for retirement income is an annuity.
The money in an annuity has the potential to create an additional source of retirement income that can supplement Social Security.
Assets placed in an annuity can even provide a variety of income streams.
This is one reason many individuals use annuities to help them achieve their long-term financial goals, including retirement income.
Here’s how a deferred annuity works.
A deferred annuity is a contract between a contract owner and a life insurance company.
As a contract owner, you pay a premium to the insurance company.
In exchange for your premium, the insurance company promises to make regular income payments to you over a period of time, beginning at some point in the future.
This is called annuitization.
You may also receive the benefits listed in the next section.
You should not buy an annuity for short-term purposes.
You generally have to keep your premium in a deferred annuity such as the Allianz MasterDex Plus Annuity for a specified period of time before you begin receiving income payments to avoid the assessment of penalties, such as surrender charges.
Annuities offer important benefits.
Potential interest during the annuity’s accumulation phase:
During this initial phase, an annuity may be an appropriate vehicle to help you accumulate money for your retirement.
Guarantees for your contract values:
If you surrender your contract, you are guaranteed to receive at least a minimum value.
Income for life and other options during the retirement income phase:
When you are ready to start taking income, the annuity offers you a range of payout options.
Some options may offer a single payment.
Others may include income payments scheduled over a specific period of time, including your entire lifetime.
Tax deferral that can help your money grow:
The money in your annuity can grow tax-deferred.
This means you don’t have to pay taxes until you begin to withdraw money from the annuity.
The power of tax deferral, compounded over the life of your annuity’s accumulation phase, may have a positive impact on the value your annuity generates for your retirement.
Any distribution may be subject to ordinary income taxes and, if taken prior to age 59½, to a 10% federal tax penalty.
Death benefit protection for your beneficiaries:
As we noted earlier, annuities are insurance products.
So it’s only natural that they can give you reassurance, knowing your beneficiaries are protected if you pass away before you start receiving income through annuitization.
Fixed index annuities are different.
A fixed index annuity has the potential to earn interest based on changes in an external index.
This is different from traditional annuities, in which credit interest calculated at a fixed rate set in the contract.
The selected index varies from day to day and is not predictable.
Many fixed index annuities also permit contract owners to allocate premium to a traditional fixed interest option, where interest is credited at a fixed rate of interest not based on any external index.
Discover the Allianz MasterDex Plus Annuity.
Protection
Allianz MasterDex Plus protects your principal from index declines.
Your principal is never subject to market index risk.
A downturn in the market index(es) cannot reduce your contract values.
We guarantee it.
Allianz MasterDex Plus locks in any interest automatically.
Once any indexed interest is credited to your annuity’s values, it can never be lost due to market index changes.
Accumulation
Allianz MasterDex Plus lets you benefit when the market index is heading up.
When the market is headed up, the value of your Allianz MasterDex Plus can also increase.
Your indexed interest rate is subject, however, to a cap or spread.
Allianz MasterDex Plus offers you choices.
The Allianz MasterDex Plus gives you several choices for calculating the potential indexed interest for your contract:
- monthly sum,
- monthly average, or
- annual point-to-point.
Flexibility
If you need cash, Allianz MasterDex Plus gives you access.
After the contract anniversary following your most recent premium payment, you may annually withdraw up to 10% of your total premiums paid – without a surrender charge.
After seven years it’s your choice: stay, or take the money.
After your seventh contract year, you can leave your money in the annuity so it continues to benefit from potential indexed interest and tax deferral.
You also have the option to take your annuity’s full value (minus any outstanding loans).
Allianz MasterDex Plus tracks market index changes then put it all together. Here’s how.
With Allianz MasterDex Plus, your potential interest is based on the fluctuations of several of America’s most recognized market indexes.
Allianz MasterDex Plus Annuity basics
Allianz MasterDex Plus is a fixed index annuity that offers a choice of indexed interest options.
Indexed interest is based on changes in these indexes:
- S&P 500
- Nasdaq-100
- FTSE 100
- A blended index that credits interest based on the performance of the Dow Jones Industrial Average (35%), Barclays Capital U.S. Aggregate Bond Index (35%), FTSE 100 Index (20%), and Russell 2000 Index (10%).
You can add money at any time during the first three contract years.
Additional premium payments made during a contract year are credited to your contract’s interim interest allocation and earn fixed interest until the following contract anniversary.
At that time your premium will be reallocated, based on your current premium allocations.
Indexed interest crediting options
Potential indexed interest is calculated based on your choice of the four indexes mentioned previously and three crediting method(s):
- Monthly average crediting
- Annual point-to-point crediting
- Monthly sum crediting
Choose from a variety of allocation options for flexibility.
When you purchase your Allianz MasterDex Plus, you can base your annuity’s potential indexed interest on one or more available index/crediting options.
You can allocate premiums in increments of 1% or more.
Change your mind? No problem!
Shortly after your contract anniversary each year, we’ll notify you that you can change your allocations.
Changes to your allocations must be submitted in writing.
If we receive your changes within 21 days after your contract anniversary, they will be effective during that contract year.
Allocation changes received more than 21 days after your contract anniversary won’t take effect until your next contract anniversary.
On every contract anniversary, any additional premium submitted during the previous contract year will be transferred from the interim interest allocation and allocated based upon your most current allocation choices.
There are no upfront sales charges.
100% of your premium is credited to your accumulation value on the day it is received.
However, surrender charges apply during the first seven contract years.
Surrender charges may result in the loss of all or part of any indexed interest or fixed interest you have earned and a partial loss of principal.
Choose from a variety of options to receive steady, predictable income.
Several annuity payment options are available to you.
If you keep your contract in deferral for at least five years, you can choose to receive annuity payments, based on your accumulation value in any of the following ways:
Interest only
You have the option to receive interest-only annuity payments for five years.
Interest will be paid as earned based on the amount of your accumulation value.
After five years of interest-only payments, you can take your full accumulation value as a lump-sum payment, or choose another payout option.
Installments for a guaranteed period
You can choose to receive annuity payments in equal installments for a period from 10 to 30 years.
Installments for life
You have the option to receive annuity payments in equal installments for the rest of your life.
Payments end upon your death.
Installments for life with a guaranteed period
You can choose to receive annuity payments in equal installments for the rest of your life.
Upon your death, annuity payments will be paid to your beneficiary for the balance of the guaranteed period, the same way as you previously selected.
Installments for a selected amount
You may receive annuity payments in equal installments of an amount that you choose, as long as the payments last for at least 10 years.
Payments continue until your accumulation value is gone.
Joint and survivor
You can have equal installments paid until your death, then continue to be paid to your survivor.
In this case, you can select 100%, ²⁄³, or ½ of your payment amount to be paid to your survivor until his/her death.
The Payout Factors
The payout rate used to determine the annuity income stream depends on the age of your contract, the age of the annuitant and the payout option selected. The interest rate in payout is guaranteed to be at least 1%.
Our Flexible Annuity Option Rider lets you receive annuity payments sooner.
The Flexible Annuity Option Rider allows you as the owner to receive annuity payments based on your accumulation value sooner.
You may exercise this option anytime after the first contract year but before the sixth contract year by electing to receive annuity payments over a period of 10 to 30 years.
Depending on your age, you may be able to receive this value over fewer than 10 years.
There is no additional charge for this rider.
Access your money sooner to help pay for nursing home care.
If you, as the contract owner, should enter a nursing home, long term care facility, or hospital for at least 30 days out of a 35-consecutive-day period after the first contract year, you may take an accelerated distribution of your contract’s accumulation value as annuity payments over a period as short as five years.
Allianz MasterDex Plus offers you a death benefit.
The Allianz MasterDex Plus Annuity provides a death benefit payable to your named beneficiary.
Regardless of whether your beneficiary(ies) select to receive the death benefit as a lump-sum payment, or as annuity income payments, they will receive the greater of the contract’s accumulation value or guaranteed minimum value (or annuity payments based on that value).
This applies only to contracts that have not yet been annuitized.
The death benefit, paid to a properly designated beneficiary (other than the estate), will pass without the costs and delays of probate.
Allianz MasterDex Plus gives you several ways to access your money.
Take free withdrawals.
In each contract year, you can take up to 10% of your contract’s paid premium in one or more free withdrawals.
There will be no surrender charge applied, as long as the money is withdrawn after the contract anniversary following your most recent premium payment.
If within the same contract year of a free withdrawal, the contract is surrendered or additional premium is added, we will retroactively apply a surrender charge to any withdrawals taken that contract year.
This may result in the loss of all or part of any interest you have earned and a partial loss of principal.
Withdrawals will decrease the value of the contract and its death benefit.
A free withdrawal is eligible to receive indexed interest at the end of the contract year.
The amount of indexed interest is based on the applicable indexed interest rate and the length of time during that contract year that the free withdrawal amount remained in the contract.
Access an additional free withdrawal if you become unemployed.
The Unemployment Benefit gives you additional access when you may need it most.
This benefit allows you, the contract owner, to receive an additional 10% of the premium paid free of surrender charge.
This additional penalty-free withdrawal is available one time during the life of the contract, as long as the contract has been in effect for at least one year, you are under the age of 65 at the time of your request for the benefit, and have been approved for state Unemployment Assistance Payments.
You also need to have received an Unemployment Assistance Payment more than 30 days after your approval for them and request this benefit within 30 days of your most recent payment.
There is no additional charge for this benefit.
Take a contract loan.
A contract loan may be taken for up to 50% of the cash surrender value (maximum of $50,000).
The loan interest rate is 7.4% annually in advance.
Loans are not available with IRA, SEP, or some other qualified plans.
Unpaid loans will be treated as partial surrenders, subject to surrender charges, and will decrease the value of the contract and its death benefit.
Access your money to help pay qualified medical costs.
The Flexible Withdrawal Rider is an optional rider that gives you additional access to your money.
This rider allows you a one-time lump-sum payment, without surrender charges, in any amount up to the contract’s accumulation value, should you become confined, after the first contract year, to an eligible nursing facility, assisted living facility, or hospital for 30 of 35 consecutive days.
This rider must be chosen at the time of application.
There is an additional charge for this rider.
Take required minimum distributions.
If your annuity is tax-qualified, we will treat the required minimum distributions calculated for this annuity as free withdrawals if you take them annually in December or monthly throughout the year.
Required minimum distributions will reduce contract values, including the death benefit, and the amount available for free withdrawals at any other time during the year.
Surrender your contract for a lump-sum payout.
You can receive your annuity’s full accumulation value at any time after seven contract years.
If you take out part or all of your contract’s value before the seventh contract anniversary, the amount you receive will be reduced by a surrender charge as shown in this chart.
A surrender charge will also apply if you annuitize prior to the sixth contract year or if the annuity payments are taken over a period of fewer than 10 years.
This could result in loss of interest and a partial loss of principal.
You could receive less than the amount of premium you put into the contract.
However, the cash surrender value will never be less than the guaranteed minimum value as described in your contract.
About the guaranteed minimum value
Your contract provides a guaranteed minimum value that you’d receive if it were higher than your contract’s cash surrender value.
The guaranteed minimum value equals 87.5% of your total premium, minus any withdrawals, crediting interest at an annual rate no less than 1.50%.
The money you take out may be taxable.
Your contract values grow tax-deferred. However, any distributions from your contract, including free withdrawals, partial withdrawals, loans, and required minimum distributions, may be taxable as ordinary income.
Because annuities are meant to be used for long-term purposes, if you are under age 59½ when a distribution is taken, it may be subject to an additional 10% federal tax penalty.
