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Editor's Corner

Alert readers, when they aren't busy giving humorist Dave Barry insights into the world, certainly have noticed one of the enduring Stable Times traditions: the last issue of the year is typically devoted to a recap of the SVIA National Forum. However, unlike for Dave Barry (who is taking a sabbatical in 2005 - boo hoo!), Stable Times alert readers haven't supplied us with really interesting human tidbits to keep our interest levels high. So we had to create them ourselves with the National Forum. This year is no different in the focus of our final issue.

As we often do, we asked skilled writer Randy Myers to provide us with succinct but complete summaries of many of the sessions at our October time in Washington, D.C. Randy unfailingly gets at the heart of presentations, and we are often amazed at how little we editors can add to his work. So we will let it speak for itself.

If you looked for them, there were some upbeat thoughts in our Forum and in the weeks following. Stable value is making inroads into Lifestyle options. Despite fears, there doesn't really seem to be a shortage of wrap capacity. As a minor remedy to insurance companies concerns over low margins in GICs, GIC purchase activity showed a big surge during the year. Paul McCulley from PIMCO thinks that expected inflation could result in favorable relative performance for stable value portfolios compared to other asset classes. Samuel Berger sees hope in the worldwide struggle in the war against terror. While we "lost" three distinguished colleagues from our SVIA board as they reached their two term limits, we re-elected talented Board members and added wonderful new ones.

Now that I have mentioned the SVIA Board, I must say one thing about my most admired and trusted INVESCO colleague: Kim McCarrel. This issue accurately points out that Kim has finished her two term limit. But there is more to Kim's presence on the Board. She got there initially by filling the remainder of a term from retiring Dennis Donahue. Then she got elected twice. But even before that, she served as Board member many years before when she was a consultant at Wyatt. I think she has been on the Board much longer than anyone in SVIA history. There has hardly been a time when Kim hasn't been one of the SVIA leaders. Our INVESCO colleague Ben Allison has some big shoes to fill, but I think he is up to the challenge.

As a final nostalgia and "so there!" comment, I couldn't help but notice something in last year's final issue. Greg Wilensky, artful and capable Editor for quite a few issues, ended his Editor's Corner last year by saying he wouldn't get his hopes up for the Red Sox or Cubs in 2004. But he did get one thing quite right: the 2004 National Forum was a winner.

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