DOL Investment Advice Guidance Published in Federal Register

Today’s Federal Register contains the Department of Labor’s (DOL’s) Employee Benefits Security Administration (EBSA) proposed guidance announced by the agency on June 29, 2020, entitled Improving Investment Advice for Workers and Retirees Exemption.

This guidance is meant to replace the DOL’s 2016 final regulations and accompanying exemptions regarding fiduciary investment advice, which—after several implementation delays—were vacated (struck down) as “regulatory overreach” by the U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals in 2018. Written comments or requests for a public hearing on this new EBSA guidance must be submitted by August 6, 2020.

Accompanying this EBSA proposed exemption is a second “vacatur” document that officially implements the Court’s vacating of the 2016 EBSA guidance, and reinstates earlier guidance that had been superseded by it.