Fee Disclosures Under 408(b)(2) Postponed Once Again

I have to say that government agencies have a tendency to be consistent. Effective dates initially published in regulations are considered aggressive by plan sponsors. And, then they get postponed, and often postponed again and again and again. So goes the progress of these regulations. If you are not familiar, you can find my initial take on them here.

For those who have not been following this particular regulation, these disclosures are the ones that will be provided by fiduciaries (plan sponsors) to plan participants, generally in defined contribution plans. They will now be effective not earlier than April 1, 2012.

I view this as good news in that worthless inevitability is being postponed.

Why worthless? Go back and read my initial take. I consider myself a fairly savvy reader of information about 401(k) investment options, and these disclosures will have little if any value to me other than curing insomnia that I might have at the moment. Fortunately, there are generally electronic disclosure options available to plan sponsors, so the decline in tree population will not be significant.