{"id":11380,"date":"2022-06-06T15:06:10","date_gmt":"2022-06-06T15:06:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nftandcrypto-news.com\/crypto\/crypto-401k-sound-financial-planning-or-gambling-with-the-future\/"},"modified":"2022-06-06T15:06:12","modified_gmt":"2022-06-06T15:06:12","slug":"crypto-401k-sound-financial-planning-or-gambling-with-the-future","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nftandcrypto-news.com\/crypto\/crypto-401k-sound-financial-planning-or-gambling-with-the-future\/","title":{"rendered":"Crypto 401(k): Sound financial planning or gambling with the future?"},"content":{"rendered":"
In April, United States-based retirement plan provider Fidelity Investments moved to allow 401(k) retirement savings account holders to invest directly in Bitcoin (BTC), the flagship cryptocurrency, making crypto a potential part of one\u2019s savings for the future.<\/p>\n
A 401(k) is a retirement savings plan offered by many U.S. employers that give the saver tax advantages and allow for several different investment options. Fidelity\u2019s move will make it easier for Bitcoin to be among those options.<\/p>\n
In a typical 401(k) plan, employees agree to have a percentage of each paycheck paid directly into an investment account created for the plan, while employers often match part or all of the employees\u2019 contributions.<\/p>\n
Fidelity is the largest retirement plan provider in the United States, and its BTC rollout will make the cryptocurrency available to more than 40 million employees \u2014 assuming their employers decide to offer it. Investors who take advantage of the initiative could effectively become tax-advantaged long-term BTC hodlers removing coins from circulation every month.<\/p>\n
The company\u2019s plan limits BTC allocations to a maximum of 20% and allows companies to make the threshold even lower. Offering cryptocurrency options for 401(k)s isn\u2019t new, however. In June 2021, another retirement plan provider, ForUsAll, partnered with Coinbase to offer BTC exposure to its account holders.<\/p>\n
ForUsAll even recently filed a lawsuit against the Department of Labor and Secretary of Labor Marty Walsh in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia, seeking the withdrawal of a compliance assistance release.<\/p>\n
The release states that the department\u2019s Employee Benefits Security Administration will \u201cconduct an investigative program aimed at\u201d 401(k) plans that include cryptocurrency. Speaking to Cointelegraph at the time, ForUsAll CEO Jeff Schulte said the government was \u201ctrying to restrict the type of investments Americans can choose to make because they\u2019ve decided today that they don\u2019t like a certain asset class.\u201d<\/p>\n
Questions of government overreach aside, it\u2019s also important to consider whether including crypto assets in a retirement plan is a good idea. The Bitcoin network has been around for over a decade and has outperformed every other asset class so far, but as any analyst will say, past performance does not guarantee future results.<\/p>\n
Considering that Bitcoin and crypto assets in general are recent financial experiments only a little over a decade old, some investors may find digital currencies too risky. Cryptocurrencies can be highly volatile, and their value has been known to plunge by up to 80% during bear markets \u2014 something that could prove disastrous ahead of someone\u2019s retirement.<\/p>\n
While employees aren\u2019t forced to withdraw from their 401(k) plans when they retire, the point of the money being there is to provide them comfort during their sunset years. Waiting for the market to recover or simply accepting such significant losses could be devastating.<\/p>\n
Recent:\u00a0Is education the key to curbing the rise of scammy, high APY projects?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n Chris Kline, co-founder and chief operating officer of Bitcoin IRA \u2014 a cryptocurrency-focused individual retirement account provider \u2014 told Cointelegraph that there is a \u201cgrowing conversation around the adoption of digital assets and their growing use case.\u201d<\/p>\n Kline pointed to Senator Tommy Tuberville from Alabama, who recently unveiled a bill, the Financial Freedom Act, that seeks to allow Americans to add cryptocurrency to their 401(k) retirement savings plans.<\/p>\n According to Kline, part of the \u201cretirement crisis we have in this country [the U.S.] is due to a lack of participation in 401(k)s.\u201d He added that such moves could be a way to get newer generations engaged through their employer-sponsored plans and help Americans retire while testifying to the resilience and relevancy of crypto assets. Kline added:<\/p>\n \u201cCrypto is certainly volatile, but its resiliency and relevancy in its short existence are remarkable. Having at least some exposure \u2014 and more importantly, experience in crypto \u2014 is becoming paramount to modern investing.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Cryptocurrencies could have the same disruptive impact on money that the internet had on communications or that email had on post offices, Kline stated.<\/p>\n Speaking to Cointelegraph, Scott Melker, a cryptocurrency influencer and the host of the Wolf Of All Streets Podcast<\/em>, noted that every investor should have \u201cat least minimal exposure\u201d to Bitcoin, with Ether (ETH) a second possibility worth considering.<\/p>\n According to Melker, even a small allocation in these assets potentially offers \u201cidiosyncratic risk and the opportunity to invest in an asset [that] can go up when everything else is dropping.\u201d Melker added that crypto markets crashing ahead of retirement might not be the biggest concern, saying:<\/p>\n \u201cAny market can crash ahead of retirement, so this is not a concern specific to Bitcoin. Investors in tech stocks right now are largely underperforming crypto in their retirement accounts.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Melker added that investors should be allowed to invest in any asset they prefer for their retirement, concluding that while self-directed IRAs are \u201cpopular for this reason,\u201d 401(k) holders haven\u2019t yet had such an option.<\/p>\n Over the past few years, more and more people have come to consider cryptocurrencies an investable asset class, with demand clearly present for retirement savings. In a survey conducted by Investopedia, one in four millennial respondents reported that they are already using crypto to help fund their retirement goals.<\/p>\n Employers, however, still have their doubts. The Plan Sponsor Council of America recently surveyed its members, which are employers sponsoring qualified savings plans, and asked whether they are considering adding crypto to their investment options. Only 1.6% responded affirmatively.<\/p>\nA volatile asset class for diversified portfolios<\/h2>\n