Retirement Plans

401(k)

MCA believes that one of the biggest responsibilities that employers/fiduciaries have (and one of the most important benefits they can provide) is to ensure that their employees are well served by any retirement program that is established for them. The investment strategies and philosophy that MCA brings, coupled with the operational expertise, capabilities and qualified plan experience of the team that MCA assembles to provide custody, reporting, trading, compliance and many other services (including many that are now being performed and separately charged for by your accountant or lawyer) makes MCA an ideal way for you to discharge this responsibility and provide this benefit.

MCA provides investment advisory services, participant orientation and ongoing participant education. Investment advisory services include not only initial and periodic modeling of investment portfolios to meet various objectives, risk tolerances and time horizons, but also researching and determining the vehicles that we believe will provide the best net total return for the various asset classes in each model. We believe that the "model" approach is far more beneficial to participants than requiring each participant on his or her own to make choices from a menu of options and is a more responsible way of helping them meet their retirement goals. Additionally, to the extent possible, we try to use funds that are in discrete asset classes, meaning that investment style-drift and fund overlap are minimized.

MCA works extensively with The Charles Schwab Trust Company ("Schwab Trust"), a division of Charles Schwab & Co., Inc. Schwab Trust acts as trustee and custodian of the plan's funds, facilitates trading in the various participants' accounts, receives and records contributions, processes distributions withdrawals and loans, and provides paying agent services (e.g., 1099-R issuance and tax withholding and reporting).

MCA also has arrangements with third-party administrators that have successfully worked with Schwab Trust. These TPAs take care of making sure that deferrals and company contributions are properly directed into the chosen allocations, take care of record-keeping, send all trades to Schwab, prepare and distribute account statements, provide online, real-time account inquiry capabilities for all participants, do all compliance testing, prepare all government forms (e.g., 5500s) and assist in the operational and logistics parts of the employee education process. They also offer in-house daily valuation and record-keeping ability, which improve the ease and efficiency of the system and therefore the participants' investment experience.

The combined cost for all of these services is a surprisingly low percentage of plan assets, which decline even further as plan assets grow. This makes an MCA quarterbacked 401(k) team an even better value, especially considering the depth and breadth of the team's collective experience and the quality and quantity of services that are included.