Nevin's Data "Points"

 Our industry has long fretted over how 401(k) participants will respond to volatile markets. And perhaps not surprisingly, these days the headlines are, generally speaking, full of “stay the course” assurances.    That said, as recently as a month ago the headlines—even OUR headlines read things like “Light 401(k) Trades in July Even as Wall Street Posts Strong Month, Hot July Brought Cool 401(k) Traders , July Brings Much-Needed Calm to 401k Trading Activity, 401(k) Trading Light in July Despite Market Gains.” As though this is a surprising result. In fact, as long as I can remember, our industry (or at least its headline writers) has long been somewhat amazed that participants have been as “resilient” in the face of volatile markets as they have—consistently—been over time. We’ve rationalized that ostensibly rational behavior in different ways, at different times. In 1987 (before there was daily trading in 401(k)s) it was said that the markets had ...

 The ROI for financial wellness has always been elusive—but a new survey suggests that it might not matter. Asked “Why are you creating or expanding your financial wellbeing program?”, respondents to Alight’s 17th edition of Hot Topics in Retirement & Financial Wellbeing  said that not only was financial wellness their top priority, more than half (56%) said that the importance of financial wellbeing has increased at their organization over the last two years, and none said the focused has decreased.  But—asked why they were creating or expanding their financial wellbeing program, the respondents largely ignored the traditional ROI metrics. The most common answer was nothing more concrete than to “enhance the overall employee experience (85%), and right behind that was the simple proposition that “we believe it is the right thing to do (84%). Even HR’s traditional favorite—“increase employee engagement”—at 72%—was well behind those arguably subjective gau...