I don’t have a 401k – what little savings I have are elsewhere. Have the 401Ks of many people nearing retirement really lost so much that they have to put off retirement?
I don’t have a 401k – what little savings I have are elsewhere. Have the 401Ks of many people nearing retirement really lost so much that they have to put off retirement?
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Im sure more knowledgeable people than me will post, but the answer is, at least in my mind, it depends. If they were invested in certain stocks and funds they are likely down, if they are nearing retirement though they should mostly be in cash and/or bonds which aren’t as subject to the ups and downs of the stock market
My IRA went from $15,000 to $9,000. Half of it is diversified S&P500 index funds.
Yes, Dowjones is currently down 6500 points from peak of 44500. I think in the first 2 days of liberation day and that was when the dowjones was at 40000ish. I lost about 30k out of 180k. Don’t know how much I am down now because I haven’t looked. I assume if I was 40+ It wouldve been a massive loss. It still is a big loss
EDIT: These tariffs mean a lot of higher prices and a lot of people going out of business. Which is why the market is responding badly
A lot of people have, yeah. And not just 401k, but anywhere (retirement account or not) where they’re invested in stocks.
Depending on what types of things they’re invested in, some people have lost way more than others.
Yes down close to 20%. So on about 1M invested that is $200,000.
Depending on how their 401ks are dispersed, maybe. Mine is managed by the company I work for and has a lot of European exposure so hasn’t been hit as bad but I’ve still lost ~5% which isn’t nothing.
I stopped looking after my losses exceeded my first salary out of college.
I mean it’s not that bad yet.
There are likely some people having to put off their retirement for this yes (however these people likely weren’t diversifying like they should have) but so far we’ve basically just lost 1 year of gains.
No fun but not devastating.
What has most people worried is just the general political situation that makes it feel like this isn’t likely to get better soon.
Short answer yes. Longer answer: a prudent person approaching retirement probably has much of their savings in other investments such as bonds and cash, so they won’t necessarily have to change short-term retirement plans. But if you’re asking if people really have taken a hit, yes, absolutely.
The stock market is down about 20%. So if your 401k was almost all stocks, then a $1 million 401k could have lost about $200k and a $3 million 401k could have lost about $600k. Those with concentrations in certain things like tech stocks could have lost more. The math of how much you can withdrawn each month (20% less) or how many years your savings will change a lot with 20% less money.
If you were invested in index funds, you probably lost about 15% since the market peaked. The peak was right before Trump started threatening tariffs – I think March or so.
At the low point the market was about where it was a year ago – essentially wiping out a year’s worth of growth. I think after the rebound it’s back to where it was 6-7 months ago.
Yes and no. Broad market indexes are down significantly from the start of the year (10-15%), but are realistically back to about a year ago. In the grand scheme that’s not a huge deal, though many will have seen significant paper losses versus recent highs so it will still look painful.
If people were nearly ready for retirement this may set them back, but it’s likely they were already on the edge.
But if this continues and follows current trends it could get much worse. If we see just the current 15-20% drop repeated, then it will really start to eat into many’s savings.
Not a 401k exactly but a similar investment account, I can share what my account has done percentage wise over the last couple months/since January.
It peaked late February, then lost 5% of its value around mid March (start of all this tariff talk and worry). Then kinda rebounded the end of March/going into April. Then April 8th it TANKED -12.5% from that high in February. Lost 1/8th of its value. In the last couple weeks it has recovered to only -6% from that high in February. Now that doesn’t majorly matter for me since I won’t be retiring anytime soon.
But like, for someone who has a life long retirement saved up, that could be a swing of tens of thousands of dollars, easily thousands of dollars. Not necessarily “end of the world” levels, but certainly “enough to make you second guess.”
Ideally people nearing retirement are on a target retirement date fund, which auto adjusts the stock/bond mixture as your retirement date nears.
If they wanted to be aggressive and chase higher yields in stocks, well this is the risk you take.
Yep, part of the reason I switched to a government job with a pension
No one has lost anything unless they sold. The price will go up and down over time, eventually ending up higher than ever before, known as a new all time high.
Yes, but if you’re close to retirement, you’re generally advised to shift your investments into something more stable than the stock market. So people who were really set on planning for retirement soon should be more insulated from the shocks. The people who were getting ready to transition into the end of their careers? They’re probably the ones feeling the hit, either having to reschedule their plans, hope the economy bounces back, or downsize their expectations for standard of living.
My 401(k) took a massive hit.
Everyone I work with, same thing.
It’s bad. It’s really bad.
>Have people really lost a significant amount of wealth in the form of the value of their 401Ks since January 2025?
“Yes”.
Nope…I moved 75% of my money from investments to low risk bonds. I’m up about 2% this year. The other 25% is locked into company stock that it’s harder to move in and out of.
I felt very confident in results like this happening.
Yes, but no one I talk to seems to care. I’m not sure why.