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."
*Requires subscription
RCH Hits Another Milestone in Preventing Retirement Savings Leakage
NAPA Net's Ted Godbout covers the news that Retirement Clearinghouse (RCH) has "hit another milestone" in its drive to bring portability and consolidation to America's defined contribution system by consolidating "more than 525,000 retirement savings accounts, encompassing more than $20 billion in assets into existing 401(k) or IRA accounts since its founding 16 years ago." Godbout notes the changing composition of consolidations, with recent volumes being influenced by assisted roll-ins performed for the Federal Thrift Savings Plan, as well as growing volumes from the Portability Services Network (PSN).
Also featured in PSCA News
How Auto Portability Is Reshaping The 401(k) Experience For New Hires
Greg Long, head of public policy and the defined contribution public sector leader at Alight Solutions, member of the Board of Directors at the Portability Services Network (PSN) and previous Executive Director of the Federal Retirement Thrift Investment Board, sits down with Russ Alan Prince of Financial Advisor Magazine to address how auto portability is reshaping the 401(k) experience for new hires. In a wide-ranging discussion, Long states that auto portability "removes....barriers, transforming what used to be an ordeal into a seamless, cost-effective process" and adds that auto portability improves plan metrics, while enhancing the effectiveness of auto enrollment -- collectively representing "a true advancement in the 401(k) experience."
More Than $20B, Across More Than 525.000 Accounts
The 401kWire's Selma Khenissi reports on the announcement from Retirement Clearinghouse (RCH) that it has consolidated over $20 billion in retirement assets, which represents "a doubling in four years." Khenissi's piece adds color to the news with quotes from RCH's Neal Ringquist, who speaks to the volumes recently contributed by the Portability Services Network (PSN) as well as the fact that these results represent "positive participant outcomes and plan metrics."
