Investors Remain Committed to Saving

Investors remain committed to saving, the Investment Company Institute (ICI) found through its analysis of defined contribution (DC) retirement plan recordkeeping data covering more than 26 million participants. In the first half of the year, only 1.8% stopped contributing to their DC plans, compared with 2.1% in the first half of 2014.

Investors also stayed the course in their asset allocations, with only 6.6% changing the asset allocation of their account balances, the same as in the first half of 2014. Only 6% changed the asset allocation of their contributions, up slightly from 5.1% in the first half of 2014.

Only 2.2% took withdrawals in the first half of 2015, compared with 2.3% in the first half of 2014, and only 0.9% took hardship withdrawals in the first six months of this year, the same as in comparable periods in the past three years.

Historically, the share of participants with loans tends to increase after the first quarter of each year, ICI said. However, at the end of June 2015, 17.5% of defined contribution participants had loans outstanding, compared with 17.4% at the end of March 2015.

The full ICI report can be downloaded here.