Social Security's 2027 raise looks bigger than it will feel
Two forecasters have converged on 3.5% for 2027, and TSCL's own polling suggests the people receiving it will call it too small — pushing the income gap into plan design.
Story archive
All Retirement Capital Daily reporting, newest first.
Ex-EBSA chief says the law never barred 401(k) advice
A former assistant secretary of labor told a vendor-hosted panel that participant-chosen advisers are permitted — which leaves the gate where it always really was, in procurement.
LIMRA's final Q2 tally slips, with fixed-rate deferred carrying the miss
The product that carried the sales boom is now the one shrinking, and the money replacing it behaves differently.
Edelman takes 3(38) fiduciary duty to the participant account
A phone-and-digital advice bundle sold through ADP pushes fiduciary risk down to the individual account, which is where small-plan competition is heading.
Alight's quietest August in 30 years hides a concentration story
Trading at 0.008% of balances shows the QDIA pipeline is doing the work, leaving plan risk in the funds absorbing 74% of contributions.
Digital experience is now a plan retention asset
J.D. Power's 53-point gap between apps and plan websites gives sponsors a measurable reason to weigh participant digital experience against the fee quote.
The Plan Website Becomes the Rollover Desk
Recordkeepers are embedding debt and wellness tools to hold the login after the last paycheck, and this week's evidence shows the digital layer, not the fund menu, now determines where the balance goes.
Candidly's debt tool rides in on four recordkeeper pipelines
Sponsors get a wellness feature without the build; recordkeepers get a reason to hold the participant after the last paycheck.
The Standard crosses $5B in pooled employer plan assets
The July 403(b) launch gives the insurer a test of whether its ERISA 3(16) partnership model travels beyond the original partners.
BofA again sweeps J.D. Power digital experience rankings
Top satisfaction with recordkeeper websites and apps now predicts rollovers and post-job retention, turning digital scores into plan-design data.
A participant's paper request survives digital delivery
Groom Law guidance says the right to a paper copy covers any electronically furnished document and survives an employer's exemption from annual paper statements.
The 401(k) adviser becomes the endowment fiduciary
Prime Capital's OCIO launch and a five-point jump in requests for full-menu discretion point the same way: the retirement-plan RIA is consolidating fiduciary control across DC and nonprofit assets.
The managed account becomes the default
Contribution data and the DOL alternatives proposal are pushing participant-level discretion from the a la carte side of the menu to the center of plan design.
Counting the employer match changes the 401(k) fairness math
An ARA study that counts employer contributions and tax-deferred growth shifts the fairness fight from contribution limits to the match.
Prime Capital launches endowment, foundation OCIO practice
The retirement plan RIA is targeting nonprofits with $5 million to $250 million in assets for fiduciary management services.
Sponsors hand advisers the menu
A five-point jump in full-menu-discretion requests moves DC advice from recommendation to delegation.
PSCA's 30th 401(k) Day targets the savers who never log in
PSCA's Sept. 10 campaign hands sponsors a free toolkit to turn automatic enrollees into active decision-makers.
Part-time careers exact outsized cuts in public plans
Pew modeling finds part-time careers and caregiving breaks cut retirement benefits more than hours lost across DB, DC and hybrid designs — a caution for sponsors who test adequacy against the full-time norm.
Alight hires retirement-income veteran to lead wealth strategy
Bruce E. Wolfe, whose background includes building Insight Investment's first U.S. retail retirement income platform, takes the SVP wealth solution leader post September 14.
PSCA taps PNC's Dall; Alight adds a wealth chief
The two personnel picks show the DC industry moving value from the plan record to the participant's wealth relationship.
Fiduciary relief, not fee savings, should lead PEP pitch
Mike Ziccardi of CBIZ wants advisors to sell the PEP's named fiduciary and independent oversight before they ever mention price.
Millennials lead Schwab SDBA growth, but boomers still hold largest balances
Average balances hit $396,767, but Millennials still hold roughly a quarter of what boomers do.
Fidelity's 401(k) record rests on plan design more than market gains
The average balance hit $155,000 in the second quarter, with 81.2% of participants capturing the full employer match and combined savings rates just below the firm's 15% target.
Empower closes Milliman deal, adding 1,500 plans
The recordkeeper now runs an estimated $2.3 trillion across 96,000 plans, with a defined-benefit specialist tucked inside.
Plan churn quietly multiplies the 401(k) leakage problem
An estimated 6.1 million participants a year face a recordkeeper change or plan termination, and former employees are the ones most likely to lose the thread.
AT&T pension suit hits the delegation wall again
A magistrate's second dismissal recommendation in the $8.05 billion Athene annuity case turns on a single ERISA question: who selected the annuity provider?
Constitution's Horizon CIT puts PE on the 401(k) menu
The new trust answers the liquidity question with a dedicated sleeve; the size of that buffer and the $1 billion pipeline are the open tests.
Target-date funds have won the DC lineup
Auto-enrollment pushed 61% of Vanguard participants into a single target-date fund; the harder problem is turning those balances into income.
Constitution Capital's Horizon CIT puts daily-priced PE inside Principal plans
Opened with more than $50 million and near-term commitments above $1 billion, the trust is the clearest test yet of private equity built for the daily-priced 401(k).
Private credit files its own ticket onto the DC menu
Four DC-bound private-credit vehicles in one week, from Ares, Shenkman, StepStone, and Jana, mark a shift from recordkeeper CITs to fund sponsors' own shelves.
The 401(k) fight moves into payroll
Deel's API-first rollout and NPPG's $4.33 billion ProManage purchase make the same bet: the point of contribution now controls the plan relationship.
NPPG buys ProManage's contribution layer in retirement M&A
The $4.33 billion platform deal is a capability purchase, pricing managed-account technology and sponsor relationships over asset count.
Deel turns 401(k) recordkeeping into a payroll feature
The API-first rollout with Human Interest and Basic Capital points to a future where the plan never leaves the payroll system workers already use.
HSAs are taking in record cash—and keeping it there
PSCA's 2026 survey found 83% of eligible employees contributed, but only 22% invested—and the HSA's retirement promise remains largely unclaimed.
PBGC rate reset cuts premium funding targets, raises late interest
August recalibration lowers variable-rate premium bases and sets late-payment interest at 7% through the fourth quarter.
Rising plan advisers put guidance ahead of new products
Early-career leaders see sponsors opening the door to advice — and they are skeptical that managed accounts have earned their fees.
The emergency fund has become the retirement plan's binding constraint
SecureSave finds a quarter of workers have already tapped retirement savings; CFP professionals report optimism that stops short of affordability.
TDF default's young win ends at $250,000
Vanguard's lineup study shows 80% of under-35 savers ride a single target-date fund — and fewer than 30% of $250,000 accounts still do.
Do your reps: advice for the 2026 Emerging Leaders
The 2025 Emerging Leaders cohort tells next year's class that client exposure and networking beat waiting to feel ready.
Washington Saves puts administrator and state partnerships out to bid
The 2027 auto-IRA program wants its vendor and partnership strategy settled before the first contribution is collected.
IRS gives rollovers a common form, a five-step standard
Notice 2026-49's voluntary framework gives plan administrators and recordkeepers a benchmark they'll be measured against.
Principal wraps private markets in CITs while DOL's benchmark stalls
The recordkeeper is attaching its own oversight to target-date CITs, aiming at the 3 percent of defined-contribution assets still stuck in alternatives while the DOL's benchmark stalls.
Higginbotham and Two West: buying the platform, not the book
The Fort Worth company's combination with a Kansas City 401(k) specialist keeps the team and platform intact — a sign retirement M&A is pricing capabilities over accounts.
For retirement advisers, digital tools can't replace the human moment
New MDRT research hands plan advisers a playbook: automate the routine, escalate the high-stakes and volatile moments to a human.
Debt pushes retirement crisis fears to a record high
Eight in 10 Americans now see a retirement crisis, and the latest NIRS survey finds debt and housing costs have replaced the savings gap as the dominant threat to retirement security.
A third of middle-class workers plan to skip retirement
A Transamerica survey puts longer work horizons and women's savings strain on the plan-design table.
Public sector workers favor family over advisers, MissionSquare finds
New MissionSquare data points advisers toward confidence-building, not more information, for public sector participants.
Payroll vendors are the gatekeepers of the Trump Account
Large employers will need a payroll vendor contract for eligibility and enrollment before any Trump Account contribution reaches a worker.
Principal packages private markets into managed CITs
The recordkeeper is targeting the 3 percent of DC assets in private markets by attaching its oversight and monitoring to target-date CITs.
Custom TDFs should replace the 'managed QDIA'
Two different risk decisions share one product name; Ron Surz argues the custom target-date fund is the simpler, DOL-friendly fix for defaulted participants.