by Structured Settlement Watchdog
SHP Financial tweets daily with deals on structured settlement payment rights. An example of the Plymouth, MA company's recent structuredsettlement hash tag bearing tweets is :
" A++ rated Jumbo #StructuredSettlement available: buy for $2.35M to lock in 5.25% annual ROI then receive 1st of 15yrs of $18,697/mo payments"
- Is there any such thing as an A++ rated structured settlement? No
- A++ is a unique rating of A.M. Best and Company. This fact is known to those of us in the insurance industry but may not be know to the readers of the SHP tweet. In another tweet SHP Financial touts an A+ rating,again without disclosing the rating agency. An A+ rating could apply to A.M. Best, S&P. Fitch or Weiss, with distinctly different meaning.
- A.M. Best is one of several rating agencies and organizations that rate insurance companies. Some of the other more familiar ones are Moodys, Fitch, Standard & Poors and Weiss.
- The product that SHP is offering is not an insurance product. The investor is not applying for an annuity, the investor is to be assigned structured settlement payment rights that are transferred to him/her/it by contract in exchange for cash and subject to court approval. No insurance license or other license is currently required to sell the product
On September 29, 2011 A.M. Best published Securitization of Period-Certain and Life-Contingent Structured Settlements. While the publication is in regard to securitizations or pools of structured settlement payment rights, it is a good information on evaluating the risk of investing in structured settlement payments rights.