IB 
Union Calendar No. 391 
114TH CONGRESS 
2D SESSION 
H. R. 4293 
[Report No. 114–511] 
To amend the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 to ensure 
that retirement investors receive advice in their best interests, and for 
other purposes. 
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 
DECEMBER 18, 2015 
Mr. ROE of Tennessee (for himself, Mr. NEAL, Mr. ROSKAM, Mr. LARSON of 
Connecticut, Mr. CARTER of Georgia, and Mr. DAVID SCOTT of Georgia) 
introduced the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on 
Education and the Workforce 
APRIL 20, 2016 
Additional sponsors: Ms. MICHELLE LUJAN GRISHAM of New Mexico, Mr. 
REED, Mr. YOUNG of Indiana, Mr. BYRNE, Mr. BOUSTANY, Mr. WILSON 
of South Carolina, Mr. CLAY, Mr. HOLDING, Mr. RENACCI, Ms. JENKINS 
of Kansas, Mrs. WALORSKI, Mr. MACARTHUR, Mr. PAULSEN, Mr. 
ASHFORD, Mr. ZINKE, Mr. DUNCAN of Tennessee, Mr. THOMPSON of 
Pennsylvania, Mr. GIBBS, Mr. GUTHRIE, Mr. BISHOP of Michigan, Mr. 
TIBERI, Mr. MEEHAN, Mr. NUNES, Mr. REICHERT, Mr. ALLEN, Mr. 
BARLETTA, Mr. MARCHANT, Mr. OLSON, Mr. CRAMER, Mr. LATTA, Mr. 
AMODEI, Mr. GOHMERT, and Mr. SESSIONS 
APRIL 20, 2016 
Reported with an amendment, committed to the Committee of the Whole 
House on the State of the Union, and ordered to be printed 
[Strike out all after the enacting clause and insert the part printed in italic] 
[For text of introduced bill, see copy of bill as introduced on December 18, 2015] 
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Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa-
tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 
This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Affordable Retirement 
Advice Protection Act’’. 
SEC. 2. PURPOSE. 
The purpose of this Act is to provide that advisors 
who— 
(1) provide advice that is impermissible under 
the prohibited transaction provisions under section 
406 of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act 
of 1974, or 
(2) breach the best interest standard for the pro-
vision of investment advice, 
are subject to liability under the Employee Retirement In-
come Security Act of 1974. 
SEC. 3. RULES RELATING TO THE PROVISION OF INVEST-
MENT ADVICE. 
(a) AMENDMENTS TO THE EMPLOYEE RETIREMENT 
INCOME SECURITY ACT OF 1974.— 
(1) DEFINITION OF INVESTMENT ADVICE.—Sec-
tion 3(21) of the Employee Retirement Income Secu-
rity Act of 1974 (29 U.S.C. 1002(21)) is amended by 
adding at the end the following: 
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‘‘(C)(i) For purposes of clause (ii) of subparagraph 
(A), the term ‘investment advice’ means a recommendation 
that— 
‘‘(I) relates to— 
‘‘(aa) the advisability of acquiring, holding, 
disposing, or exchanging any moneys or other 
property of a plan by the plan, plan partici-
pants, or plan beneficiaries, including any rec-
ommendation whether to take a distribution of 
benefits from such plan or any recommendation 
relating to the investment of any moneys or 
other property of such plan to be distributed 
from such plan; 
‘‘(bb) the management of moneys or other 
property of such plan, including recommenda-
tions relating to the management of moneys or 
other property to be distributed from such plan; 
or 
‘‘(cc) the advisability of retaining or ceas-
ing to retain a person who would receive a fee 
or other compensation for providing any of the 
types of advice described in this subclause; and 
‘‘(II) is rendered pursuant to— 
‘‘(aa) a written acknowledgment of the obli-
gation of the advisor to comply with section 404 
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with respect to the provision of such rec-
ommendation; or 
‘‘(bb) a mutual agreement, arrangement, or 
understanding, which may include limitations 
on scope, timing, and responsibility to provide 
ongoing monitoring or advice services, between 
the person making such recommendation and the 
plan that such recommendation is individualized 
to the plan and such plan intends to materially 
rely on such recommendation in making invest-
ment or management decisions with respect to 
any moneys or other property of such plan. 
‘‘(ii) For purposes of clause (i)(II)(bb), any disclaimer 
of a mutual agreement, arrangement, or understanding 
shall only state the following: ‘This information is not indi-
vidualized to you, and you are not intended to materially 
rely on this information in making investment or manage-
ment decisions.’. Such disclaimer shall not be effective un-
less such disclaimer is in writing and is communicated in 
a clear and prominent manner and an objective person 
would reasonably conclude that, based on all the facts and 
circumstances, there was not a mutual agreement, arrange-
ment, or understanding. 
‘‘(iii) For purposes of clause (i)(II)(bb), information 
shall not be considered to be a recommendation made pursu-
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ant to a mutual agreement, arrangement, or understanding, 
and such information shall contain the disclaimer required 
by clause (ii), if— 
‘‘(I) it is provided in conjunction with full and 
fair disclosure in writing to a plan, plan participant, 
or beneficiary that the person providing the informa-
tion is doing so in its marketing or sales capacity, 
including any information regarding the terms and 
conditions of the engagement of the person providing 
the information, and that the person is not intending 
to provide investment advice within the meaning of 
this subparagraph or to otherwise act within and 
under the obligations of the best interest standard as 
described in this subparagraph; 
‘‘(II) the person providing the information is a 
counterparty or service provider to the plan in con-
nection with any transaction based on the informa-
tion (including a service arrangement, sale, purchase, 
loan, bilateral contract, swap (as defined in section 
1a of the Commodity Exchange Act (7 U.S.C. 1a)), or 
security-based swap (as defined in section 3(a) of the 
Securities Exchange Act (15 U.S.C. 78c(a)))), but 
only if— 
‘‘(aa) the plan is represented, in connection 
with such transaction, by a plan fiduciary that 
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is independent of the person providing the infor-
mation, and, except in the case of a swap or se-
curity-based swap, independent of the plan spon-
sor; and 
‘‘(bb) prior to such transaction, the inde-
pendent plan fiduciary represents in writing to 
the person providing the information that it is 
aware that the person has a financial interest in 
the transaction and that it has determined that 
the person is not intending to provide investment 
advice within the meaning of this subparagraph 
or to otherwise act as a fiduciary to the plan 
subject to section 404; 
‘‘(III) the person providing the information is 
an employee of any sponsoring employer or employee 
organization who provides the information to the 
plan for no fee or other compensation other than the 
employee’s normal compensation; 
‘‘(IV) the person providing the information dis-
closes in writing to the plan fiduciary that the person 
is not undertaking to provide investment advice as a 
fiduciary to the plan subject to section 404 and the 
information consists solely of— 
‘‘(aa) making available to the plan, without 
regard to the individualized needs of the plan, 
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securities or other property through a platform 
or similar mechanism from which a plan fidu-
ciary may select or monitor investment alter-
natives, including qualified default investment 
alternatives, into which plan participants or 
beneficiaries may direct the investment of assets 
held in, or contributed to, their individual ac-
counts; or 
‘‘(bb) in connection with a platform or 
similar mechanism described in item (aa)— 
‘‘(AA) identifying investment alter-
natives that meet objective criteria specified 
by the plan, such as criteria concerning ex-
pense ratios, fund sizes, types of asset, or 
credit quality; or 
‘‘(BB) providing objective financial 
data and comparisons with independent 
benchmarks to the plan; 
‘‘(V) the information consists solely of valuation 
information; or 
‘‘(VI) the information consists solely of— 
‘‘(aa) information described in Department 
of Labor Interpretive Bulletin 96–1 (29 C.F.R. 
2509.96–1, as in effect on January 1, 2015), re-
gardless of whether such education is provided to 
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