WealthDefender 10 Bonus Plus review

Depends on what you're optimizing for. As a legacy or "boost my starting balance and don't touch it" play, WealthDefender 10 Bonus Plus is reasonably competitive — the bonus is real, it vests immediately at death, and the built-in chronic illness waiver adds a genuine safety valve. As a pure growth vehicle judged on crediting terms alone, it's less impressive: the mandatory 0.85% fee for the bonus, combined with cap rates in the 5-6% range on the flagship S&P 500 strategy, means a meaningful share of the bonus's value is quietly given back over the 10-year hold.

Someone would buy this because the 22.5% first-year bonus (19.5% for issue ages 76+) meaningfully raises the account value the day the contract is funded, which matters most to buyers doing legacy planning or rolling over a maturing CD or annuity and wanting an immediate step-up. The full-account-value death benefit — no surrender charge, no MVA, no bonus recapture, and the bonus fully vested even in year one — makes this a stronger legacy vehicle than most bonus FIAs, where a portion of the bonus is often still forfeitable at death. The built-in ADL/nursing-home/terminal-illness waiver adds a no-cost safety net that many competing products charge extra for.

This fits buyers roughly 55-75 who have non-qualified or qualified money they're confident they won't need for a full 10 years, who want a bigger starting account value for eventual legacy transfer to beneficiaries, and who are not looking for a guaranteed income stream from this specific contract. It is a poor fit for anyone who might need more than 10% of the account value in a given year, anyone especially rate-sensitive (the bonus's cost via the 0.85% charge eats into competitiveness versus a no-bonus FIA with a higher cap), and anyone whose primary retirement goal is guaranteed lifetime income — this product has no income rider, built-in or optional.

Strip away the "22.5% bonus" headline and what you're actually buying is a 10-year fixed indexed annuity where Ibexis fronts you extra account value at issue, then recovers the cost of that bonus through an ongoing 0.85% annual charge deducted from your account value every month for the life of the surrender period. You're not getting free money — you're getting financed money, and the financing cost is baked into the contract whether or not the indices perform well in a given year. On top of that structure sits standard FIA index crediting (caps, participation rates) that determines how much interest you earn each year. The generous part of the deal is what happens if you die: the entire account value, including the fully vested bonus, passes to your beneficiary with no surrender charge, no market value adjustment, and no bonus recapture — a genuinely strong legacy feature that a lot of competing bonus annuities don't match.

The core feature is the account-value premium bonus: Ibexis adds 22.5% of your premium to the account value in year one (19.5% at issue ages 76 and older). That bonus is subject to a recapture schedule that starts at 95% in year one and steps down to 10% by year ten — meaning if you surrender the contract early, Ibexis takes back most or all of the bonus on a sliding scale, on top of the separate surrender charge on the base contract. The bonus is paid for through a mandatory 0.85% Premium Bonus Rider Charge, deducted monthly from account value for the entire 10-year surrender period — this is the feature that distinguishes the "Bonus Plus" version from a plain WealthDefender Bonus contract with a smaller (or no) bonus and no rider fee. Interest is then credited on top of that bonus-inflated balance using one of three crediting methods — Annual Point-to-Point, Biennial Term End Point, or a fixed declared rate — across the S&P 500, the Nasdaq-100 Engle 10% Index, or the Barclays Tactical Growth Index, with caps, participation rates, or a fixed rate applied depending on the strategy chosen.

The second most important feature is the death benefit and bonus vesting design. Unlike many premium-bonus annuities where the bonus vests gradually and a chunk is still forfeitable if the owner dies early, WealthDefender 10 Bonus Plus fully vests the bonus at death regardless of contract year, and pays the full account value with no surrender charge, MVA, or bonus recapture applied. A surviving spouse who is the sole beneficiary can also continue the policy rather than being forced to take a lump sum. Combined with the built-in chronic illness waiver — which lets you access funds penalty-free for ADL-qualifying events, nursing home confinement, or terminal illness after the first contract anniversary, at no extra rider cost — this contract has more built-in downside protection for the policyholder and their family than its cap rates alone would suggest.

You can withdraw up to 10% of account value each year after the first contract year without triggering withdrawal charges, MVA, or bonus recapture — standard for the category — but you must leave a minimum $5,000 balance in the contract and withdrawals/surrenders below $1,000 aren't permitted. Above that 10% threshold, or during a full surrender, you're exposed to two separate penalties stacked together: the standard surrender charge (starting at 9% and stepping down to 0.9% by year ten) and the bonus recapture schedule (starting at 95% and stepping down to 10% by year ten), plus a market value adjustment (MVA — an adjustment tied to interest-rate movement that can push your surrender value up or down) that can apply on top of both. RMDs get favorable treatment: they're not available in the first contract year and must be processed by the prior carrier before a transfer, but after that, RMD amounts are treated as penalty-free withdrawals — even if they exceed the 10% free amount — with no surrender charge, MVA, or recapture. This is a 10-year commitment in practice, not just on paper; anyone who thinks they may need a large lump sum before year ten should look elsewhere.

There's no explicit base contract fee disclosed, but the mandatory 0.85% Premium Bonus Rider Charge functions as one: it's deducted monthly from account value for all 10 years regardless of index performance, and it exists specifically to pay for the 22.5% bonus. Over a full 10-year hold that's roughly 8.5 cumulative percentage points of account value, which meaningfully narrows the gap between this bonus version and a no-bonus WealthDefender contract that likely offers better cap rates in exchange for skipping the bonus and the fee. Current cap rates on the flagship S&P 500 Annual Point-to-Point strategy (5.00%-6.00%) are on the lower end for the category, which compounds the fee drag. The one piece of good fee-related news is the bailout provision: if the S&P 500 cap renews below Ibexis's declared bailout rate, you get a 30-day penalty-free, no-MVA window to move your money — a real backstop against a low-cap trap in later years.

Legal Entity: Ibexis Life & Annuity Insurance Company

A.M. Best Rating: A-