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 PUBLISHED
 UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
  FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT

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MARY M. HAGWOOD, co-

administrator of the estate of Toni

J. Odom; TAMMY O. REEVES, co-

administrator of the estate of Toni

J. Odom; TONY C. ODOM,

Plaintiffs-Appellants,

  v. No. 01-1909

CHARLES C. NEWTON, JR.; BELLSOUTH

CORPORATION; BELLSOUTH

SAVINGS AND SECURITY PLAN;

BELLSOUTH EMPLOYEE STOCK

OWNERSHIP PLAN,

Defendants-Appellees.

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 Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Eastern District of North Carolina, at Raleigh.
 W. Earl Britt, Senior District Judge.
 (CA-00-106-5-BR(3))
 Argued: January 23, 2002
 Decided: February 26, 2002
 Before NIEMEYER and TRAXLER, Circuit Judges, and
Cynthia Holcomb HALL, Senior Circuit Judge of the
United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit,
 sitting by designation.

____________________________________________________________

Affirmed by published opinion. Judge Niemeyer wrote the opinion,

in which Judge Traxler and Senior Judge Hall joined.

____________________________________________________________

 COUNSEL

ARGUED: John N. Hutson, Jr., HOWARD, STALLINGS, FROM &

HUTSON, P.A., Raleigh, North Carolina, for Appellants. Michael

Terry Medford, MANNING, FULTON & SKINNER, P.A., Raleigh,

North Carolina, for Appellees. ON BRIEF: Brian E. Moore, HOW-

ARD, STALLINGS, FROM & HUTSON, P.A., Raleigh, North Caro-

lina, for Appellants. John C. Dorsey, MANNING, FULTON &

SKINNER, P.A., Raleigh, North Carolina, for Appellees.

____________________________________________________________

 OPINION

NIEMEYER, Circuit Judge:

A month before they were married, Toni Odom and Charles New-

ton signed a "Premarital Agreement," agreeing that the property of

each would remain separate after their marriage and explicitly waiv-

ing any right to each other's property. Two years after Odom and

Newton were married, Odom died. Her estate and her father now seek

to enforce the Premarital Agreement against Newton's spousal rights

in Odom's employee stock plan and savings plan, conferred on New-

ton by § 205(a) of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of

1974, as amended by the Retirement Equity Act of 1984 ("ERISA"),

29 U.S.C. § 1055(a). Because the Premarital Agreement did not com-

port with ERISA's formal requirements for waiver of Newton's spou-

sal rights, we conclude that the agreement cannot be enforced to deny

Newton's spousal rights in Odom's benefit plans. Accordingly, we

affirm the judgment of the district court, which reached the same con-

clusion.

 I

Toni Odom and Charles Newton met in 1983 while both were

working as linemen and line-splicers for BellSouth Corporation. A

few months later, they began living together. Each was a participant

in BellSouth's Employee Stock Ownership Plan ("ESOP") and its

Savings and Security Plan ("SSP"). In 1987, Odom named Newton

her beneficiary on the SSP, but she did not name a beneficiary on the

ESOP.

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Odom and Newton decided to get married in 1995. Because Odom

wanted to ensure that some of her stock holdings would be passed on

to her father for his care, Odom and Newton agreed, one month

before their marriage, to sign a formal Premarital Agreement drawn

up by an attorney and executed before a notary public. The agreement

provided that "all separately owned property and the income from it

belonging to each of them at the commencement of the marriage or

obtained by either of them during the marriage shall remain his or her

separate property and that neither party will obtain any rights in the

property of the other by virtue of the marriage." The agreement

referred explicitly to "any stocks, bonds, employee savings and secur-

ity plans and retirement accounts." Newton specifically waived any

rights that he had in Odom's "employee savings and security plans

and retirement accounts." Both Odom and Newton executed releases

of "marital rights" which provided, in the case of Newton, that he

"does hereby waive and release unto Ms. Toni J. Odom, her heirs,

executors, administrators and assigns (a) all rights to a distributive

share of Mrs. Toni J. Odom's estate upon her death; . . . and (f) all

other rights and interest in property, real and personal, which he has

or may acquire by reason of Ms. Toni Odom's death." The agreement

did not mention by name the BellSouth ESOP and SSP, and neither

party included language designating a beneficiary for individually

owned property.

In 1996, Odom began experiencing symptoms of Cruetzfeldt-Jakob

Disease (commonly known as "mad cow's disease"), a rare, fatal

brain disorder which causes rapid, progressive dementia and associ-

ated neuromuscular disturbances. After her illness had been mis-

diagnosed as a mental illness, Odom was treated in several hospitals.

By September 1997, while she was a patient at Dorothea Dix Hospital

in Raleigh, North Carolina, doctors reported that she was confused

and delusional - "she lives in a `dream world'" - although they

reported that with confrontation she could be brought back to reality.

During this period, Newton had Odom execute a power of attorney

giving him "full power to act in [her] name, place and stead." A few

months later, on January 12, 1998, Newton exercised the power of

attorney to designate himself as beneficiary on the BellSouth ESOP

and SSP. Two weeks later Odom died - at age 41.

Odom's estate and her father (collectively the "Estate") com-

menced this action against Newton to give effect to the intent evi-

 3

denced by the Premarital Agreement of having Odom's property

distributed through her estate as her separate property and to reverse

Newton's actions in designating himself the beneficiary of Odom's

ESOP and SSP. To that end, the complaint sought a declaratory judg-

ment, as well as damages for fraud, constructive fraud, breach of con-

tract, conversion, and breach of fiduciary duty. It also requested that

the court impose a constructive trust over Newton's interest in the

ESOP and SSP. Newton filed an answer to the complaint, denying the

claims. In addition, he requested a declaratory judgment that he was

"the proper and legal beneficiary under the BellSouth employee bene-

fit plans."

On the parties' cross-motions for summary judgment, the district

court entered judgment for Newton, declaring that he was "the benefi-

ciary of all amounts in Toni J. Odom's account under the BellSouth

Saving and Security Plan and BellSouth's Employment Stock Owner-

ship Plan." In reaching this judgment, the court reasoned that the Bell-

South ESOP and SSP were governed by ERISA and that, under

ERISA, the Premarital Agreement did not constitute "an effective

waiver of benefits under [29 U.S.C.] § 1055 and the plans." The court

concluded that the Estate's request to establish a constructive trust

over the property and to set aside Newton's designation of himself as

a beneficiary were preempted by ERISA and effectively decided by

the court's ruling on the waiver issue.

From the district court's judgment, the Estate filed this appeal.

 II

The parties agree that BellSouth's ESOP and SSP are pension plans

that are regulated by ERISA. See 29 U.S.C. § 1002(2)(A) (defining

"employee pension benefit plan" and "pension plan"); see also Boggs

v. Boggs, 520 U.S. 833, 836 (1997) (applying ERISA's requirements

to a BellSouth employee savings plan and a BellSouth ESOP).

Section 205 of ERISA requires that each pension plan of a partici-

pant, whose plan has vested but who dies before the annuity starting

date, provide to the surviving spouse a "qualified preretirement survi-

vor annuity." 29 U.S.C. § 1055(a)(2). That section also provides that

these surviving-spouse rights may be waived only if:

 4

(i) the spouse of the participant consents in writing to such

election [to waive], (ii) such election designates a benefi-

ciary (or a form of benefits) which may not be changed

without spousal consent (or the consent of the spouse

expressly permits designation by the participant without any

requirement of further consent by the spouse), and (iii) the

spouse's consent acknowledges the effect of such election

[to waive] and is witnessed by a plan representative or a

notary public.

Id. § 1055(c)(2)(A).

Implementing these requirements, the BellSouth plans themselves

included provisions requiring that any consent waiving spousal rights

be given formally. The ESOP provided:

If you are married, it is a legal requirement that your spouse

be your sole beneficiary, unless your spouse agrees by sign-

ing the appropriate form to let you designate a primary ben-

eficiary other than, or in addition to, your spouse. Your

spouse's signature must be notarized.

Similarly, the SSP provided:

[I]f a Participating Employee has a surviving "Spouse" . . .

at his death, his surviving Spouse shall be deemed to be his

designated beneficiary for the entire nonforfeitable amount

in his Account, unless . . . such Spouse has consented (or

consents) in writing as to the designation of a specific per-

son or persons (including a trust) as beneficiary of all or part

of the Participating Employee's Account, and such consent

is witnessed by a notary public and acknowledges the effect

of such designation.

In sum, under both ERISA and the language of the plans, in order

for Newton to have waived his spousal rights, he must have executed

a writing, witnessed by a plan representative or a notary public, in

which he designated a beneficiary other than himself and acknowl-

edged that he was giving up the rights conferred on him by ERISA.

 5

The question presented in this case is whether the Premarital

Agreement signed by Newton and Odom fulfills the waiver require-

ments of ERISA and the two plans. For the reasons that follow, we

conclude that the Premarital Agreement does not fulfill these require-

ments.

First, when Newton signed the Premarital Agreement, he did not

possess the spousal rights conferred on him by 29 U.S.C. § 1055(a).

He was not Odom's spouse and therefore could not satisfy the

requirement of § 1055(c) that "the spouse of the participant consent[ ]

in writing to such election [to waive]." Although Newton clearly indi-

cated in the Premarital Agreement that he intended to and indeed

would waive such rights when he became married, he did not, after

he became married, execute a formal waiver giving up the spousal

rights that he then acquired. Perhaps Odom could have compelled

Newton to sign such a document by invoking the provision of the Pre-

marital Agreement that "each of the parties to this Agreement shall

execute, acknowledge, and deliver all documents and instruments that

may be deemed necessary to accomplish the terms of this Agree-

ment," but she did not do so. As a result Newton, as a spouse, never

provided the written consent required by 29 U.S.C. § 1055(c) and by

the language of the plans themselves.

The Estate argues that the Premarital Agreement, although exe-

cuted before the marriage, nevertheless had the effect of a post-

marriage waiver because the intent of the parties was clear. We agree

with the Estate that Odom and Newton's intent at the time they exe-

cuted the Premarital Agreement was clear. But that intent was mani-

fested before their marriage. We have no evidence of Newton's intent

after he became Odom's spouse and after he had statutorily acquired

his ERISA spousal rights in her pension plans. Thus, the intent

revealed in the Premarital Agreement may not have been Newton's

intent once he had the spousal rights, and ERISA requires that that

intent be manifested anew by the spouse through the formalities of a

consent in conformance with 29 U.S.C. § 1055(c).

The spousal rights conferred by § 1055(a) were intended to "ensure

a stream of income to surviving spouses," Boggs, 520 U.S. at 843, and

the formalities required in § 1055(c) are included to protect against

the risks of a spouse's unwitting waiver of those rights, Lasche v.

 6

George W. Lasche Basic Profit Sharing Plan, 111 F.3d 863, 867

(11th Cir. 1997) (noting that formalities are necessary "to ensure a

valid waiver of a spouse's retirement plan [and] are consistent with

the legislative policy of protecting spousal rights"). ERISA's formali-

ties must, therefore, be strictly enforced. In Lasche, for example, the

court held that a waiver was invalid under § 1055 simply because the

signatures had not been witnessed by a notary as required by that sec-

tion. Id.

Our conclusion that a premarital agreement cannot serve as a valid

waiver of spousal rights as required by 29 U.S.C. § 1055(c) is further

confirmed by the Internal Revenue Service's ("IRS") similar conclu-

sion with respect to the identical requirements in the Internal Revenue

Code provisions of ERISA. With the adoption of ERISA, Congress

enacted mirror-image counterparts for the Internal Revenue Code to

encourage employers, through tax benefits, to establish qualifying

pension plans. See Gillis v. Hoechst Celanese Corp., 4 F.3d 1137,

1144-45 & 1144 n.6 (3d Cir. 1993). Thus, the provisions of 29 U.S.C.

§ 1055(c) are repeated in haec verba in 26 U.S.C. § 417(a), and the

Secretary of the Treasury adopted regulations interpreting § 417(a).

Those regulations include the following interpretation:

Q[uestion] 28: Does consent contained in an antenuptial

agreement or similar contract entered into prior to marriage

satisfy the consent requirements of sections 401(a)(11) and

417?

A[nswer] 28: No. An agreement entered into prior to mar-

riage does not satisfy the applicable consent requirements,

even if the agreement is executed within the applicable elec-

tion period.

Treasury Regulation § 1.401(a)-20. Because the IRS is an agency "en-

trusted to administer" the tax counterpart of ERISA, we defer to its

interpretation of 26 U.S.C. § 417(a). See Chevron, U.S.A., Inc. v.

Nat'l Res. Def. Council, Inc., 467 U.S. 837, 844 (1983); see also Hur-

witz v. Sher, 982 F.2d 778, 782 (2d Cir. 1992) (applying Treasury

Regulation § 1.401(a)-20 to support a conclusion that premarital

agreement did not waive spousal benefits under § 205 of ERISA).

  7

In reaching our conclusion that premarital agreements generally

cannot fulfill the requirements of 29 U.S.C. § 1055(c), we join the

unanimous view of other federal courts that have considered the ques-

tion. See, e.g., National Automobile Dealers & Assocs. Retirement

Trust v. Arbeitman, 89 F.3d 496, 502 (8th Cir. 1996) (holding that an

agreement "signed before the marriage failed to satisfy the waiver

requirements of ERISA"); Hurwitz, 982 F.2d at 782 (holding that pre-

marital agreements "do not constitute effective waivers under

ERISA"); Ford Motor Co. v. Ross, 129 F. Supp. 2d 1070, 1073-74

(E.D. Mich. 2001) (holding that "premarital agreement cannot be used

to circumvent ERISA's spousal waiver requirements"); Zinn v. Don-

aldson Co., 799 F. Supp. 69, 73 (D. Minn. 1992) (same); Nellis v.

Boeing Co., No. 91-1011-K, 1992 WL 122773, *4 (D. Kan. May 8,

1992) (holding that a premarital agreement was not valid waiver

because it "was not signed while [the wife] was a spouse with current

vested rights in the plans"). But see Estate of Hopkins, 574 N.E.2d

230 (Ill. Ct. App. 1991) (holding that premarital agreement was valid

waiver under 29 U.S.C. § 1055 even though the parties were not yet

married).

Our second reason for concluding that the Premarital Agreement in

this case did not satisfy 29 U.S.C. § 1055(c) is that the agreement did

not "designate[ ] a beneficiary" for the survivor benefits as required

by 29 U.S.C. § 1055(c)(2)(A)(i). In order to ensure that a surviving

spouse clearly understand that he or she will not be the beneficiary

designated by ERISA, ERISA requires that the surviving spouse actu-

ally designate another beneficiary who will receive the benefits in lieu

of the surviving spouse. Not only does this requirement ensure volun-

tariness, but it gives the surviving spouse control over who would

receive the benefits in lieu of the surviving spouse. The Premarital

Agreement did not satisfy this requirement.

The Estate argues that the Premarital Agreement's reservation of

property to Odom's estate serves as the designation of a beneficiary.

The Agreement provided that Newton was releasing his rights "unto

Mrs. Toni J. Odom, her heirs, executors, administrators and assigns."

We conclude, however, that this language does not amount to the des-

ignation of a beneficiary as required by ERISA. See Arbeitman, 89

F.3d at 502; Zinn, 799 F. Supp. at 73; Nellis, 1992 WL 122773 at *4.

 8

In sum, we conclude that the Premarital Agreement in this case

does not fulfill the requirements of 29 U.S.C. § 1055(c) because it

was executed by parties who were not married and because § 1055

requires that a spouse who actually has, by marriage, the statutory

benefit conferred by § 1055(a) waive the right by executing a formal

consent form. Additionally, we conclude that Newton did not desig-

nate an alternative beneficiary in signing the Premarital Agreement.

The Estate queries, with some understandable distress, why the

parties' intent should not be given effect. But the law is filled with

formalities required to ensure a clear record of a party's intent in par-

ticular types of transactions. For example, the statute of frauds

requires a writing for specified transactions; the law of wills and

estates imposes witnessing requirements for wills; and real property

law demands a writing and recordation for conveyances of real prop-

erty. So too, ERISA requires a notarized writing with specific lan-

guage to waive spousal rights. These are not merely "perfunctory

matters." Davis v. Williford, 271 U.S. 484, 488 (1926) (declaring a

will invalid because it did not have an attached "certification of

acknowledgment" as required by federal statute). As the Supreme

Court observed in Davis, legal formalities avoid the uncertainty that

would result if subjective evidence of important transactions were

permitted. Id. at 487-88.

Because the Premarital Agreement between Odom and Newton did

not meet ERISA's requirements for a waiver of spousal rights, it did

not operate as a valid waiver of those rights. Accordingly, we affirm

the judgment of the district court.

 AFFIRMED
 9