Integrated investment and insurance accounts

Abstract

The techniques disclosed herein generally relate to providing insurance via an integrated investment and insurance account. An integrated account may have an owner, and may include an investment vehicle portion and an insurance policy portion. The investment vehicle portion may include or be associated with one or more investment vehicles via which the account owner may invest money and, based on the invested funds, the insurance policy portion may provide insurance for which the account owner is designated as the insured party. Premiums for the insurance policy portion may be borne by the operating expenses of the investment vehicle portion. Additionally, a payout or benefit amount of the insurance provided by such integrated accounts may be based on the value of accumulated assets under management of the investment vehicle portion at the time of the payout.

1 . An integrated account provider system, the system comprising:
 a communication interface configured to communicatively couple the system to a communications network;   one or more processors; and   a non-transitory computer-readable memory storing computer-executable instructions that, when executed by the one or more processors, cause the system one or more processors to:
 access, via a first link to the communications network, an entry on a data storage device, the entry corresponding to an integrated account, 
 establish an investment vehicle portion of the integrated account on the data storage device via the first link by storing, in the entry, an indication of an amount of funds invested by an owner of the integrated account in one or more investment vehicles, the one or more investment vehicles structured to return gains to the one or more investment vehicles and to make the returned gains available for immediate withdrawal by the owner, and the one or more investment vehicles having one or more beneficiaries that receive total assets under management (AUM) of the one or more investment vehicles at a time of death of the owner, 
 establish an insurance policy portion of the integrated account on the data storage device via the first link by storing, in the entry, an indication that the owner is designated as an insured party of one or more insurance policies, an indication of a premium of the insurance policy portion, and an indication that an amount of a payout of a particular insurance policy of the one or more insurance policies is determined based on a value of total AUM of the one or more investment vehicles at a time of the payout, 
 receive, via a second link to the communications network from an investment vehicle computing system, a signal indicating that an operating expense has been assessed on at least a part of the amount of funds invested in the one or more investment vehicles, 
 store an indication of the operating expense assessed on the at least the part of the amount of funds in the entry, 
 apply at least a portion of the operating expense assessed on the at least the part of the amount of funds towards a premium of the particular insurance policy, thereby providing insurance for the owner, 
 receive, at a user interface of the system via a third link to the communications network, one or more indications of at least one of a change to the one or more insurance policies from an insurance policy computing system, or receive via the second a third link to the communications network one or more indications of a change to the one or more investment vehicles from the investment vehicle computing system, and 
 trigger, in response to the one or more indications, one or more changes to the entry stored in the data storage device via an application programming interface based on the received one or more indications. 
   
     
     
         2 . The system of  claim 1 , wherein funds for a payout of at least one of the one or more insurance policies are provided from funds other than actual AUM of the one or more investment vehicles. 
     
     
         3 . The system of  claim 1 , wherein particular insurance policy has been approved by an underwriting process that is a subset of an underwriting process for a stand-alone insurance policy that designates the owner as the insured party and that provides a same type of insurance as provided by the particular insurance policy. 
     
     
         4 . The system of  claim 3 , wherein the particular insurance policy includes a coverage delay preventing the payout for a duration following the underwriting process, and wherein the coverage delay does not prevent the payout when the owner suffers an accidental death within the duration. 
     
     
         5 . The system of  claim 3 , wherein the particular insurance policy is a group insurance policy, and the underwriting process designates each listed individual as the insured party. 
     
     
         6 . The system of  claim 1 , wherein at least one of the one or more insurance policies is a life insurance policy, at least one of the one or more changes includes listing a beneficiary designated to receive the payout associated with the life insurance policy, and the instructions, when executed by the one or more processors, further cause the one or more processors to:
 trigger, upon a death of the owner, an automatic re-invest option for the beneficiary to re-invest the payout in a new integrated account.   
     
     
         7 . The system of  claim 1 , wherein the one or more investment vehicles exclude at least one of a tax-deferred investment vehicle or an annuity, and wherein at least one of the one or more insurance policies includes a maximum coverage limit indicating an entirety of the total AUM. 
     
     
         8 . The system of  claim 1 , wherein at least one of the one or more investment vehicles receives periodic investments, the at least one of the one or more investment vehicles receiving the periodic investments includes a coverage delay corresponding to a coverage amount associated with the periodic investments. 
     
     
         9 . The system of  claim 1 , wherein the instructions, when executed by the one or more processors, further cause the one or more processors to:
 receive, at a user interface of the system, a cancellation indication of at least one of the one or more insurance policies being cancelled or transferred by the owner; and   trigger, in response to the cancellation indication, a coverage lapse corresponding to the at least one of the one or more insurance policies.   
     
     
         10 . The system of  claim 1 , wherein the owner provides the indication of the amount of funds invested by the owner over the communication network, and the communication network includes one or more of (i) a website, (ii) a telephone line, and (iii) a store location. 
     
     
         11 . A method to provide integrated insurance and investment accounts, the method comprising:
 access, by one or more processors, via a first link to a communications network, an entry on a data storage device, the entry corresponding to an integrated account,   establishing, by the one or more processors, an investment vehicle portion of the integrated account on the data storage device via the first link by storing, in the entry, an indication of an amount of funds invested by an owner of the integrated account in one or more investment vehicles, the one or more investment vehicles structured to return gains to the one or more investment vehicles and to make the returned gains available for immediate withdrawal by the owner, and the one or more investment vehicles having one or more beneficiaries who are designated to receive total assets under management (AUM) of the one or more investment vehicles at a time of death of the owner,   establishing, by the one or more processors, an insurance policy portion of the integrated account on the data storage device via the first link by storing, in the entry, an indication that the owner is designated as an insured party of one or more insurance policies, an indication of a premium of the insurance policy portion, and an indication that an amount of a payout of a particular insurance policy of the one or more insurance policies is determined based on a value of total AUM of the one or more investment vehicles at a time of the payout,   receiving, by the one or more processors via a second link to the communications network from an investment vehicle computing system, a signal indicating that an operating expense has been assessed on at least a part of the amount of funds invested in the one or more investment vehicles,   storing, by the one or more processors, an indication of the operating expense assessed on the at least the part of the amount of funds in the entry,   applying, by the one or more processors, at least a portion of the operating expense assessed on the at least the part of the amount of funds towards a premium of the particular insurance policy, thereby providing insurance for the owner,   receiving, by the one or more processors, at a user interface of the system via a third link to the communications network, one or more indications of at least one of a change to the one or more insurance policies from an insurance policy computing system, or receive via the second link to the communications network one or more indications of a change to the one or more investment vehicles from an investment vehicle computing system, and   triggering, by the one or more processors, in response to the one or more indications, one or more changes to the entry stored in the data storage device via an application programming interface based on the received one or more indications.   
     
     
         12 . The method of  claim 11 , wherein funds for a payout of at least one of the one or more insurance policies are provided from funds other than actual AUM of the one or more investment vehicles. 
     
     
         13 . The method of  claim 11 , wherein the particular insurance policy has been approved by an underwriting process that is a subset of an underwriting process for a stand-alone insurance policy that designates the owner as the insured party and that provides a same type of insurance as provided by the particular insurance policy. 
     
     
         14 . The method of  claim 13 , wherein the particular insurance policy includes a coverage delay preventing the payout for a duration following the underwriting process, and wherein the coverage delay does not prevent the payout when the owner suffers an accidental death within the duration. 
     
     
         15 . The method of  claim 13 , wherein particular insurance policy is a group insurance policy, and the underwriting process designates each listed individual as the insured party. 
     
     
         16 . The method of  claim 11 , wherein at least one of the one or more insurance policies is a life insurance policy, at least one of the one or more changes includes listing a beneficiary designated to receive the payout associated with the life insurance policy, and the method further comprises:
 triggering, upon a death of the owner, an automatic re-invest option for the beneficiary to re-invest the payout in a new integrated account.   
     
     
         17 . The method of  claim 11 , wherein the one or more investment vehicles exclude at least one of a tax-deferred investment vehicle or an annuity, and wherein at least one of the one or more insurance policies includes a maximum coverage limit indicating an entirety of the total AUM. 
     
     
         18 . The method of  claim 11 , further comprising:
 receiving periodic investments for at least one of the one or more investment vehicles, wherein the at least one of the one or more investment vehicles receiving the periodic investments includes a coverage delay corresponding to a coverage amount associated with the periodic investments.   
     
     
         19 . The method of  claim 11 , further comprising:
 receiving, at a user interface of the system, a cancellation indication of at least one of the one or more insurance policies being cancelled or transferred by the owner; and   triggering, in response to the cancellation indication, a coverage lapse corresponding to the at least one of the one or more insurance policies.   
     
     
         20 . The method of  claim 11 , further comprising:
 receiving, via the communication network, the indication of the amount of funds invested by the owner, wherein the communication network includes one or more of (i) a website, (ii) a telephone line, and (iii) a store location.