Target-date funds hold $2.36 trillion inside large 401(k) plans, and 69% of it sits in collective investment trusts (CITs). Sorting that money by the year its savers expect to retire shows where the trust wrapper has taken hold, and where it hasn't.

The gradient

The money retiring soonest is the least likely to be in a trust: just over half of the 2010 vintage. From the 2020 vintage on, the CIT share is essentially flat at 67% to 70%.

Why the oldest money lags

The 2010 and 2015 vintages hold money that was invested years ago, often in mutual fund series a plan chose before it moved its default to a trust, and these vintages are shrinking as savers retire and roll over. New contributions flow to the vintages further out, and those are mostly in the wrapper plans use today. In other words, the gradient is mostly a picture of the past: the trust became the standard target-date vehicle, and the remaining mutual fund money is concentrated where new money no longer arrives.

Size explains far more than age

The bigger difference is plan size. CITs hold 14% of target-date money in plans under $25 million, 31% in plans of $100 million to $250 million, 66% in plans of $250 million to $1 billion, and 93% in plans over $1 billion. A participant's retirement year moves the CIT share by a few points; their employer's plan size moves it by eighty.

About the data

Figures cover 401(k) plans with more than 100 participants that list their holdings on Schedule H of Form 5500, for plan year 2024 (52,763 plans). Dollars are the plans' holdings in mutual funds, collective investment trusts (CITs) and pooled separate accounts on the Schedule of Assets Held.

Every plan, fund and manager behind these numbers is in Axiomatic Plan Intelligence. For more information, email us at info@axiomaticdata.com.

Updated November 2026 with figures from the latest complete plan year (2024). The original LinkedIn post used an earlier version of our data, so some numbers differ.

Originally posted on LinkedIn.