Lockheed Defends Pension Risk Transfers Driving New Litigation

Lockheed Martin Corp.'s decision to remove workers from its pension plan using annuities from Athene Holding Ltd. is legally permissible and hasn’t caused injuries that would support a legal challenge, the aerospace and defense company said.

The two-month-old lawsuit seeks a “novel ruling” that a longstanding and common corporate practice violates federal law, even though the challengers have suffered no injury because of it, Lockheed said in a May 3 motion to dismiss. The workers’ complaint “reads like an op-ed,” Lockheed said, and it includes little to no support for their arguments against pension risk transfers, which are mechanisms ...