Everything is changing.

Your clients face a new financial landscape — and so do you.

For 65 years, Jackson has been a trusted partner to advisors and their clients, and we never stand still. Discover new ways to help your clients plan for life, not just retirement.

Top trends

Jackson continually monitors the industry.

This ensures we can best meet the needs of financial professionals like you and your clients. Using our insights and expertise, we have identified key trends that impact how your clients think about money and retirement planning.

Volatility masks a steady US recovery

The Great Recession, the Pandemic, record-high inflation—it seems like economic turbulence never ends. But those shocks hide the underlying strengths of declining unemployment, a rising stock market, and continued GDP growth despite short-term market tremors. Jackson is committed to providing ongoing industry and economic research an insights that can help you plan for both the long-term opportunities and the short-term challenges.

GDP growth of 3.8% in Q2 2025 beats the ~2% average over a decade.¹

AI reshapes the financial advice industry

Over the past decade, financial planning has shifted from office-based meetings to digital platforms, mobile apps, and now AI-driven advice engines that automate onboarding, portfolio design and ongoing guidance. Investment in AI and machine learning continues to rise, accelerating hyper-personalized, always-on planning. That’s why we’re leading new planning models that focus on life blueprints, not just retirement plans. As clients modernize how they think, research, and plan, we make sure you have the tools to guide them in a data- and technology-driven world.²

Robo-Advisor market growth: ³

$8.01 bn

in 2024

$33.38 bn

in 2030

Crypto crosses into the mainstream

Crypto and other digital assets are moving into the financial mainstream, increasingly appearing alongside stocks and bonds in client portfolios and increasingly accepted as payment methods across the US. ⁴

As financial planning evolves, advisors need a clear, balanced view of where crypto fits — and where it doesn’t. We’re focused on giving you the insight and context to guide clients thoughtfully, helping them make informed decisions within a diversified, flexible, long-term financial plan.

Crypto currency market growth: ⁵

$2.9 bn

in 2024

$5.9 bn

in 2030

Compliance takes a growing role in financial planning

As retirement, savings, and investment decisions grow more complex, regulatory scrutiny increases to better protect investors without sacrificing investment innovation. Fiduciary standards capture more rollover and one-time retirement advice, pushing professionals to document best-interest recommendations across IRAs, 401(k)s, and annuity solutions. Jackson monitors the compliance landscape to help you to continue to deliver the clear, confident guidance your clients need to achieve their long-term goals.

$345 million

SEC distributions to harmed investors, 2024

$8.2 billion⁶

SEC-ordered financial remedies to investors, 2024

It's time for a new financial blueprint.

Your clients aren’t retiring – they're getting ready for new ways to live their lives.

We’ve focused on four major trends, but the reality is broader. Market volatility, rapid technological change, evolving asset classes, and sustained pressure from inflation, interest rates, housing, and healthcare costs are all reshaping the questions clients bring to you and the kind of planning they now require.

Together, these shifts are driving the most important change in financial planning today: the move from retirement planning to creating a Financial Blueprint for Life. This is not about whether advisors guide clients. It is about how planning must evolve to reflect longer, less linear lives.

Traditional retirement planning was built around a relatively clear sequence. Accumulate assets during full-time employment, then transition to a defined mix of IRAs, 401(k)s, Social Security, and predictable income in retirement. It assumed a clean shift from earning to drawing down.

That model no longer reflects reality. Many clients will continue working in some form, manage multiple income streams, revisit major financial decisions later in life, and adjust spending as priorities change over time. Planning now needs to accommodate flexibility, longevity, uncertainty, and ongoing reinvention, not just end-of-career optimization.

Your clients may be stepping away from traditional careers, but they are not retiring from life. What they need from you is not simply a retirement plan, but a Financial Blueprint for Life, one designed to evolve as markets change, opportunities emerge, and life itself keeps moving.

Four tips to shift your financial planning conversations

No two clients follow the same path. Goals change - plans must too.

A personal Financial Blueprint for Life moves beyond traditional planning for a single endpoint: retirement. Instead, it guides clients through a continuing journey to adjust to life changes, make confident decisions, and keep long-term goals on track.

Four tips to shift your financial planning conversations

Make market insight your superpower.

Translate complexity into perspective, showing how trends, volatility, and uncertainty reinforce the value of planning, diversification, and long-term thinking.
Interpret trends and data to deliver regular, personalized take-aways that your clients can connect with.

Use co-creation to drive commitment.

Build plans with clients, not for them. Co-creation deepens trust, increases follow-through, and helps clients feel ownership.
When people see their values, goals, and tradeoffs reflected in the plan, they’re more confident sticking with it as life changes.

Get clients ready for everything, not just retirement.

Help clients plan for transitions, not just an end date. Work may evolve, income may shift, and priorities will change.
A strong blueprint prepares clients for multiple paths—combining work, lifestyle, and protection—so they feel ready for whatever comes next.

Build a plan for living and for life.

Reframe planning as a way to support how clients want to live today and tomorrow.
Focus on flexibility, income sustainability, and confidence, not just accumulation.
The goal isn’t stopping, but enabling choice, stability, and purpose throughout life’s later chapters.

Up next:

Mindset matters

Recognize the six Money Mind States that shape how clients think, decide, and plan.

Bureau of Economic Analysis, "Gross Domestic Product, 2nd Quarter" (https://www.bea.gov/data/gdp/gross-domestic-product); World Bank Group, "GDP Growth: United States" (https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GDP.MKTP.KD.ZG?locations=US).
FTI Consulting, "AI Investment Landscape in 2025: Opportunities in a Volatile Market." https://www.fticonsulting.com/insights/articles/ai-investment-landscape-2025-opportunities-volatile-market
Grant Ejimone, Absrbd, "Robo-Advisor 2026 Statistics." https://www.absrbd.com/post/robo-advisor-statistics
Grand View Horison, "Global Cryptocurrency Market Size & Outlook, 2025-2030." https://www.grandviewresearch.com/horizon/outlook/cryptocurrency-market-size/global
Research and Markets, "Cryptocurrency Market Report 2025." https://www.researchandmarkets.com/reports/5596085/cryptocurrency-market-report-2025
U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, "SEC Announces Enforcement Results for Fiscal Year 2024", https://www.sec.gov/newsroom/press-releases/2024-186

Why Jackson

New ways to connect

Let's do business