Retirement Assets Total $29.8 Trillion
in Second Quarter 2019

Washington, DC; September 25, 2019– Total US retirement assets were $29.8 trillion as of June 30, 2019, up 2.3 percent from March 31, 2019. Retirement assets accounted for 33 percent of all household financial assets in the United States at the end of June 2019.

US Total Retirement Market Assets
Trillions of dollars, end-of-period, selected periods

^e Data are estimated.

Note: For definitions of plan categories, see Table 1 in "The US Retirement Market, Second Quarter 2019."

Components may not add to the total because of rounding.

Sources: Investment Company Institute, Federal Reserve Board, Department of Labor, National Association of Government Defined Contribution Administrators, American Council of Life Insurers, and Internal Revenue Service Statistics of Income Division

Assets in individual retirement accounts (IRAs) totaled $9.7 trillion at the end of the second quarter of 2019, an increase of 2.9 percent from the end of the first quarter of 2019. Defined contribution (DC) plan assets were $8.4 trillion at the end of the second quarter, up 2.6 percent from March 31, 2019. Government defined benefit (DB) plans— including federal, state, and local government plans—held $6.2 trillion in assets as of the end of June 2019, a 0.7 percent increase from the end of March 2019. Private-sector DB plans held $3.2 trillion in assets at the end of the second quarter of 2019, and annuity reserves outside of retirement accounts accounted for another $2.2 trillion.

Retirement Assets by Type
Billions of dollars, end-of-period, 2019:Q1–2019:Q2

^e Data are estimated.

Sources: Investment Company Institute and Federal Reserve Board

Defined Contribution Plans

Americans held $8.4 trillion in all employer-based DC retirement plans on June 30, 2019, of which $5.8 trillion was held in 401(k) plans. In addition to 401(k) plans, at the end of the second quarter, $545 billion was held in other private-sector DC plans, $1.1 trillion in 403(b) plans, $339 billion in 457 plans, and $617 billion in the Federal Employees Retirement System’s Thrift Savings Plan (TSP). Mutual funds managed $3.8 trillion, or 65 percent, of assets held in 401(k) plans at the end of June 2019. With $2.2 trillion, equity funds were the most common type of funds held in 401(k) plans, followed by $1.1 trillion in hybrid funds, which include target date funds.

401(k) Plan Assets
Billions of dollars, end-of-period, selected periods

Components may not add to the total because of rounding.

Sources: Investment Company Institute, Federal Reserve Board, and Department of Labor

Individual Retirement Accounts

IRAs held $9.7 trillion in assets at the end of the second quarter of 2019. Forty-six percent of IRA assets, or $4.5 trillion, was invested in mutual funds. With $2.5 trillion, equity funds were the most common type of funds held in IRAs, followed by $952 billion in hybrid funds.

IRA Market Assets
Billions of dollars, end-of-period, selected periods

^e Data are estimated.

Components may not add to the total because of rounding.

Sources: Investment Company Institute, Federal Reserve Board, American Council of Life Insurers, and Internal Revenue Service Statistics of Income Division

Other Developments

As of June 30, 2019, target date mutual fund assets totaled $1.3 trillion, up 4.1 percent from the end of March 2019. Retirement accounts held the bulk (87 percent) of target date mutual fund assets, with 68 percent held through DC plans and 19 percent held through IRAs.

Target Date Mutual Fund Assets
Billions of dollars, end-of-period, selected periods

Components may not add to the total because of rounding.

Source: Investment Company Institute

The quarterly retirement data tables are available at “The US Retirement Market, Second Quarter 2019.”

Technical Notes

The Investment Company Institute’s total retirement market estimates reflect revisions to previously published data. Updated methods for estimating the amount of retirement assets in broker street name and omnibus accounts resulted in slight downward revisions to mutual fund assets held by retirement accounts.