The latest Investment Company Institute (ICI) survey of defined contribution plan participants found that savers mostly stayed the course with their asset allocations last year despite strong stock market returns.
ICI’s report, “Defined Contribution (DC) Plan Participants’ Activities, First Three Quarters of 2016,” showed that 8.1 percent of DC plan participants changed the asset allocation of their account balances, largely unchanged from the previous year. Also, 5.6 percent changed the asset allocation of their contributions, slightly lower compared with the same time frame a year earlier.
The ICI study also found that almost all plan participants continued investing in their plans during the first three quarters of 2016, with only 2.4 percent not contributing. This is down slightly from the first three quarters of 2015 when 2.5 percent stopped contributing.
Only 2.8 percent of participants took withdrawals in the first three quarters of 2016 compared with 2.9 percent the previous year. Just 1.2 percent took hardship withdrawals compared with 1.3 percent in the first three quarters of 2015. In addition, 17.0 percent of DC plan participants had loans outstanding, compared with 17.4 at the end of 2015.
The ICI study tracks data covering more than 28 million participant accounts in employer-based DC plans.