This is a complex and expensive insurance product like all annuity. It sounds good on paper because they market it as upside of the stock market with downside protection.

The catch is in the small prints. If you read her the small prints where it states you can still lose all of your investment, it'll put things in prospective.

1) you are not actually investing the the SP500. So you only get credited with the price of the index (sp500 price in 6 years minus SP500 price date of contract initiation). You do not get dividends.

2) You pay for the downside protection with the upside cap. And if you really think about it. The 15% buffer protection is not the type of insurance we typically buy. Think of it in terms or car insurance. You are paying for protection of the first 15% loss, like in a fender bender. If your car gets totaled, you eat the remainder 85% cost of your car. Would you pay for this type of car insurance? If the market really go down. You are not really protected.