in VALIC establishes that variable annuities are not the “business of insurance.” In VALIC, the Supreme Court found that variable annuities are securities because they lack the traditional earmarks of insurance. The Court stated that “we conclude that the concept of ‘insurance’ involves some investment risk-taking on the part of the company. The risk of mortality, assumed here, gives these variable annuities an aspect of insurance. Yet it is apparent, not real; superficial, not substantial. In hard reality the issuer of a variable annuity that has no element of a fixed return assumes no true risk in the insurance sense.” VALIC, 359 U.S. at 71, 79 S.Ct. 618. See also NationsBank of N.C., N.A. v. Variable Annuity Life Ins. Co., 513 U.S. 251, 264, 115 S.Ct. 810, 130 L.Ed.2d 740 (1995) (<HOLDING>); SEC v. United Benefit Life Ins. Co., 387 U.S.
holding that under minnesota law an insurance policy or provision not filed with the commissioner of insurance is unenforceable holding that a federal statute 12 usc  92 which expressly permits national banks to sell insurance in small towns is a statute which specifically relates to the business of insurance and preempts a state statute which prohibits banks from selling insurance holding a federal law permitting national banks to sell insurance in towns with less than 5000 residents preempted a state statute prohibiting banks from selling most types of insurance holding that comptroller of currencys holding that annuities both fixed and variable are not insurance within the meaning of 12 usc  92 2000 a provision allowing banks to sell insurance products in towns with less than 5000 inhabitants was a reasonable interpretation of the statute and stating that fixed annuities more closely resemble insurance than do variable annuities  holding a variable annuity issued by an insurance company to be a covered security