SECURE 2.0 Adoption Trends: Plan Sponsors Lean Into Enhanced Catch-Up Contributions
Writing in 401k Specialist, Editor-in-Chief Brian Anderson offers insights into Vanguard's analysis of SECURE 2.0 adoption trends by their plan sponsor clients. With respect to auto portability adoption, Anderson writes that "the new analysis also shows auto portability is gaining traction" -- referencing the Vanguard analysis which found that "7% of its plans had adopted" the feature by year-end 2025. Anderson notes that this "comes on the heels of other recordkeepers announcements" and cites a November 2025 report by Fidelity indicating that more than one-third of its 26,500 plans have already adopted auto portability. Anderson adds that "[a]uto portability offers a structural solution to retirement savings leakage -- an issue policymakers have long targeted."
Plan Sponsors Warm Up to Super Catch-Up
PLANSPONSOR's Emily Boyle reviews a 2/10/26 Fiduciary & Regulatory Insights report from Vanguard's Jeffrey Clark, which examines optional provisions of SECURE 2.0 that are beginning to take hold with their plan sponsor clients. Boyle writes that the Vanguard analysis concludes that, "[b]y year-end 2025, 7% of plans had adopted auto-portability," and quoted Clark's piece as characterizing the results as "a modest step with significant long-term potential.”
Retirement Readiness Improves, But Long-Term Concerns Remain
Writing in RoughNotes.com and covering a recent Harkin Institute Symposium, Thomas McCoy, CLU, discusses the "macro-view of workers’ prospects for retirement security" and see reasons for optimism. McCoy cites remarks made by Kelly Hahn, Vanguard’s head of retirement research, whose firm is a member of the Portability Services Network and supports auto portability for their plan sponsor clients. Hahn suggested that auto portability could eventually play a role in preserving saving rates when an employee enrolls in a new employer's plan. Also attending was Groom Law Group's Michael Kreps, who remarked that auto portability was a solution for cashout leakage and for minimizing small balances left behind at former employers.
Defined Contribution Top Trends for 2026: What Plan Sponsors Need to Get Right
In their forward-looking article noting the key issues that plan sponsors need to "get right" for 2026, TheAdviserMagazine outlines the top trends for the year. Focusing on regulatory and compliance issues, the authors write: "plan sponsors should be aware of two key initiatives: automatic portability and the Retirement Savings Lost and Found Database. Both are designed to help participants maintain or reclaim retirement savings as they transition between jobs throughout their career."
Andy Reed: Inertia Is the Most Powerful Force in Behavioral Finance
Andy Reed, Vanguard’s head of behavioral economics research, is the featured guest on Morningstar's "The Long View" podcast, and offers his hosts his expert views on how investors think, feel, and make decisions. During the discussion, the conversation turns to the topic of cashout leakage, where Reed states: "I think auto-portability is a really compelling solution to this problem.....being able to move your pockets of money from one plan to another can be really powerful in kind of maintaining that saving and investing momentum."
2025: A Breakthrough Year for Portability
Writing in 401k Specialist, RCH’s Tom Hawkins looks back on 2025, when three important developments emerged related to the topic of retirement savings portability. Taken together, Hawkins asserts that these developments represent a “breakthrough year for portability” and that “the pattern from 2025 is clear: retirement savings portability—especially for small-balance accounts—is becoming a more central element of plan design discussions."
Millions Could Close the Retirement Gap with One Small Change
Writing in Money, lead data journalist Adam Hardy examines the beneficial impact of automatic features for 401(k) plans and their participants. Hardy draws heavily on the results of a March 2025 EBRI Issue Brief which detailed the benefits of 3 "automatic" features, including auto enrollment, auto escalation and auto portability, and quotes EBRI's director of wealth benefits research Craig Copeland. Hardy includes the study's key auto portability-related result, which found that "when automatic portability alone is used by all plans, the reduction in the retirement savings shortfall reaches over 11 percent for those ages 35–39."
401(k) Plan-to-Plan Rollovers Hit $20B: Retirement Clearinghouse
Ignites' Beagan Wilcox-Volz covers the 12/16/25 announcement by Retirement Clearinghouse (RCH) that it has "moved $20 billion in assets from old accounts held through former employers' plans into new, active accounts or IRAs since 2009, when [the firm] was founded." Importantly, the article notes that "[t]he $20 billion milestone includes small 401(k) accounts moved by the Portability Services Network, an industry 'utility' established by Retirement Clearinghouse and six recordkeepers, which are founding owner members of the network — Alight, Fidelity, Empower, Principal, Vanguard and TIAA."
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