Jeffrey Epstein didn’t just sit in a conference room with Leon Black and Marc Rowan. But in the newest batch of Epstein files, he discussed tax strategy and business architecture with them around the early structural formation of Athene, the insurer now central to the modern PRT market. While some defenders minimized this as a “personal” matter, the structural implications were not personal at all — they were foundational.
At their core, Pension Risk Transfers (PRTs) are a mechanism for corporate sponsors to shed pension liabilities and for insurers to extract spread-based profits — at retirees’ expense. While the sales pitch frames PRTs as “risk neutral” or “equivalent” to a traditional defined benefit promise, the economic reality is starkly different: PRTs steal millions in value from retirees and redistribute it to sponsors and insurers. When a corporate pension is transferred to an insurer: PBGC insurance disappears. The insurer (Apollo) collects upfront profits and ongoing spread economics by investing assets at higher yields than they credit back to retirees.
The net result is a direct transfer of value: From the retiree’s pocket → To the corporate sponsor and the insurer’s shareholders. It steals millions from retirees over the long term and turns defined benefit pensions into an orphaned credit exposure with no fiduciary backstop. While Jeffrey Epstein is not alive to reap the benefits, his buddies Leon Black and Marc Rowan at Apollo are. The Trump DOL supports Apollo/Athene in attempting to block any litigation to protect retirees.
https://commonsense401kproject.com/2026/01/11/dols-prt-annuity-amicus-brief-dismantling-erisa/ MorningPulse?
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