Nearly half of Gen Z and millennials want crypto to be part of their 401(k) retirement plansaccording to a survey conducted in October by US asset manager Charles Schwab.
By asking participants what they would like to see added to their 401(k) retirement products, the firm found that 46% of Gen Z and 45% of millennials said they “wish” they could invest in crypto as part of their retirement planning.
It shouldn’t be a surprise, since The survey also found that 43% of Gen Z and 47% of Millennials are already investing in crypto outside of their 401(k), which could suggest the group’s affinity for the asset class..
The asset manager surveyed 1,100 401(k) retirement plan participants ages 21-70 to complete the 10-minute survey held between April 4 and 19, 2022.
Survey participants had to have worked at a company with 25 or more employees and be current contributors to their company’s 401(k) plans.
The Millennial generation generally refers to those born between the early 1980s and mid-1990s, while Gen Z has generally been born between the mid-to-late 1990s and early 2010s.
The results contrast sharply with those of Generation X and Boomersborn between the mid-1940s and the late 1970s, as only 31% and 11%, respectively, want to invest in crypto through their 401(k) plan, and even fewer are current investors in the asset class.
Inflation was generally considered the main obstacle to retirement.
Nevertheless, a similar study by Investopedia in April found that only 28% of US-based Millennials and 17% of Gen Z surveyed expected to use crypto to support themselves in retirement.
The asset manager does not currently offer any crypto investments as part of its 401(k) retirement plans.although cryptocurrency-based retirement funds have been in the works since February 2019.
In April, Fidelity Investment reportedly launched plans to open up bitcoin (BTC) investing for ts 401(k) retirement savings account holders.and savers were allowed to allocate up to 20% bitcoin to their savings account.
In Australia, Rest Super became the first superannuation fund to offer crypto allocation as part of a diversified portfolio to its 1.9 million members in November 2021.
While most digital asset retirement funds are offered in the form of bitcoin or Ether (ETH), a Northern Virginia county speculated on putting a proportion of retirees’ pension funds into a decentralized finance (DeFi) yield farming account in May 2022, which was later approved in August 2022.
But things can go wrong. A Quebec pension fund lost nearly all of its $154.7 million, which was heavily invested in now-bankrupt crypto lending platform Celsius.
Controversies like this have left US senators divided on the seriousness of the risks that come with 401(k) retirement plans exposed to cryptocurrencies..
They include Senators Elizabeth Warren, Dick Durbin and Tina Smith.which have previously argued that it is a “bridge too far” to expose Americans’ “hard-earned” retirement funds to “cryptocurrency casinos.”
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