Boston, MA – Casner & Edwards, LLP announces that David C. Valente, an attorney practicing in the firm’s Trusts & Estates Group, was a speaker at the American Bar Association’s (ABA) 28th Annual Spring Symposia CLE Meeting in Boston, MA. The event included two days of CLE programming on estate planning and real property topics.
On May 12th from 1:15 - 2:45 p.m., Valente served as a panelist for the session, “Dividing Retirement Funds on Death or Divorce,” which addressed the issue of who receives retirement funds when there is a death or divorce, and discussed complex ERISA and estate planning considerations. The panel explored:Critical differences at death and divorce between ERISA plans and non-ERISA arrangements such as IRAs, and between qualified and non-qualified plans;
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QDROs (Qualified Domestic Relations Orders), including recent cases involving post-mortem QDROs;
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Optimizing required minimum distributions after death;
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Beneficiary designations, including designation of trusts as beneficiaries of retirement funds;
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Choice of contingent beneficiaries and the default beneficiary trap;
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Disclaimers of interests in retirement plans;
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Protecting retirement assets from creditors after death; and
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Considerations for high net worth individuals and small business owners regarding planning with retirement assets.
As part of his speaking role, Valente also authored the paper, “Drafting Trusts to Receive Retirement Plan Proceeds.”
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