The White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs completed its review of the Department of Labor's proposed rule "Fiduciary Duties in Selecting Designated Investment Alternatives" on March 24, 2026. The review was marked "consistent with change" and classified as "economically signifi...
"401(k)s exist to help people save for a secure retirement, not gamble on speculative assets with no intrinsic value." — Lee Reiners, Lecturing Fellow, Duke Financial Economics Center
The White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs completed its review of the Department of Labor's proposed rule "Fiduciary Duties in Selecting Designated Investment Alternatives" on March 24, 2026. The review was marked "consistent with change" and classified as "economically significant." The rule, which originated from President Trump's August 7, 2025 executive order on alternative assets in retirement plans, now moves to EBSA for formal publication and a 60-day public comment period.
At stake: $14.2 trillion in defined-contribution plan assets, of which $10.1 trillion sits in 401(k) accounts alone, according to Investment Company Institute data from Q4 2025. The proposed rule would create a fiduciary framework giving plan sponsors explicit legal cover to offer cryptocurrency, private equity, and other alternative assets as designated investment options—provided they meet due diligence and disclosure thresholds. It is not a mandate. It is a liability shield.
The timing is contentious. Bitcoin has lost roughly 50% from its October peak, erasing approximately $2 trillion in total crypto market capitalization as of February 2026. A December 2024 GAO report found crypto usage in defined-contribution plans remains below 1% of total plan investments, with DOL lacking systematic tools to even measure adoption. The rule arrives into a market where the theoretical addressable pool is enormous but actual demand, regulatory infrastructure, and fiduciary clarity remain thin.
The proposed rule, titled "Fiduciary Duties in Selecting Designated Investment Alternatives," updates guidance under ERISA (Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974). Its core function is to provide plan sponsors—employers who administer 401(k) plans—with a clearer fiduciary framework for including alternative assets such as cryptocurrency, private equity, private credit, real estate, and infrastructure in their plan menus.
What it does:
What it does not do:
Labor Secretary Lori Chavez-DeRemer framed the shift in terms of deregulation. According to reporting by ABA Banking Journal, she characterized the Biden-era 2022 compliance release—which had urged "extreme caution" on crypto in retirement plans—as "governmental overreach," stating that "investment decisions should be made by fiduciaries, not DC bureaucrats."
The regulatory pathway follows a clear sequence:
| Date | Event | |------|-------| | Dec 2021 | DOL issues Supplemental Private Equity Statement narrowing 2020 guidance on alternatives | | Mar 2022 | DOL Compliance Assistance Release warns fiduciaries to exercise "extreme caution" before offering crypto | | Aug 7, 2025 | Trump signs Executive Order "Democratizing Access to Alternative Assets for 401(k) Investors" | | Aug 12, 2025 | DOL rescinds Biden-era 2021 Supplemental Private Equity Statement | | May 28, 2025 | DOL formally withdraws 2022 crypto compliance release | | Jan 13, 2026 | DOL submits proposed rule to OIRA for interagency review | | Mar 24, 2026 | OIRA completes review; marks it "consistent with change" | | TBD | EBSA publishes proposed rule; 60-day comment period begins |
The 180-day clock from the executive order expired in early February 2026. The DOL delivered the proposed rule to OIRA roughly five months after the executive order—ahead of the original timeline, though publication has yet to occur.
According to the Investment Company Institute's Q4 2025 quarterly data release, total employer-based defined-contribution plan assets stood at $14.2 trillion:
For context, total U.S. retirement assets across all vehicles (IRAs, DC plans, DB plans, annuities) approached $50 trillion by Q3 2025, according to 401k Specialist Magazine citing ICI data.
The proposed rule applies to ERISA-governed plans. The TSP, governed by separate federal statute, is not directly affected. Excluding TSP, approximately $13.1 trillion in DC plan assets fall under the rule's potential scope.
Even a fractional allocation shift would move significant capital. A 1% allocation across the $10.1 trillion 401(k) market alone would represent $101 billion—roughly equivalent to the combined market capitalization of Solana and Cardano.
The GAO's December 2024 report (GAO-25-106161) found that cryptocurrency represents less than 1% of defined-contribution plan investments. The report noted DOL cannot systematically measure adoption because plans with fewer than 100 participants are not required to report granular investment data, and larger plans aggregate data in ways that obscure crypto exposure.
As of early 2026, only two major providers offer crypto access within 401(k) plans:
Fidelity Investments — Announced in April 2022 that employers could opt into a Digital Assets Account allowing participants to allocate up to 20% of balances to Bitcoin. Fidelity has not publicly disclosed employer adoption rates or participant utilization numbers.
ForUsAll — A smaller provider focused on startups and small businesses. As of November 2022, ForUsAll reported 50 employer plans live with crypto access, serving approximately 80,000 total retirement savers across 500+ plans. Updated 2026 figures have not been publicly released.
The gap between the theoretical $14.2 trillion market and actual adoption is stark. Plan sponsors have been deterred by fiduciary liability risk, not lack of product availability. The proposed rule aims to close precisely this gap.
Bitcoin inclusion in 401(k) plans has been technically permissible under ERISA since inception. No statute explicitly prohibits it. The obstacle has been practical, not legal.
Under ERISA Section 404, fiduciaries must act "with the care, skill, prudence, and diligence under the circumstances then prevailing that a prudent man acting in a like capacity and familiar with such matters would use." An employer who added a crypto option to a 401(k) menu and saw it decline 50% in value faced potential litigation from plan participants arguing the inclusion violated this prudence standard.
Without explicit regulatory protection, plan sponsors simply would not take the risk. According to Morgan Lewis analysis from August 2025, "the practical reality is that the litigation risk has been the single greatest barrier to adoption."
The proposed rule addresses this by establishing a clear diligence framework. If a plan sponsor follows the prescribed evaluation process—assessing volatility, liquidity, custody, and valuation methodology—they gain defensible grounds against future litigation. It transforms the question from "should you include crypto" to "did you follow the process."
This matters because ERISA litigation is not theoretical. According to the Plan Sponsor Council of America, fiduciary breach lawsuits in the DC plan space have increased in volume and scope over the past decade, with excessive-fee litigation remaining a persistent category.
Opposition is concentrated around three institutional voices.
Senator Elizabeth Warren wrote to SEC Chair Paul Atkins in January 2026, stating: "For most Americans, their 401(k) represents a lifeline to retirement security rather than a playground for financial risk. Allowing crypto into American retirement accounts creates fertile ground for workers and families to lose big." Warren pressed the SEC to explain how it would ensure fair valuation of crypto assets, assess manipulation risks, and provide awareness for retail investors exposed through retirement plans. She requested responses by January 27, 2026.
The Government Accountability Office (GAO-25-106161) identified multiple risk vectors: extreme volatility, valuation opacity, custodial and recordkeeping vulnerabilities, fraud and theft exposure, and the evolving regulatory status of individual tokens—some of which could be later classified as unregistered securities. The GAO recommended Congress consider legislation to address federal regulatory gaps over crypto assets in retirement accounts.
The Economic Policy Institute published an analysis warning that the policy shift could create "regulatory arbitrage" favoring sophisticated investors while leaving ordinary retirees vulnerable to speculative bubbles. EPI noted that cryptocurrency "has already proven to be an incredibly vulnerable, unstable, and largely unregulated asset susceptible to market speculation and huge dips—exactly the opposite of what you want included in a stable, reliable retirement portfolio." The institute also flagged that many institutional investors have been reducing, not increasing, their alternative asset exposure due to concerns about lackluster returns, cost, and illiquidity.
Notably, the American Bankers Association has historically opposed measures routing retirement capital toward crypto, citing volatility and valuation concerns.
The policy debate collided with market reality in early February 2026. Bitcoin fell approximately 50% from its October peak, erasing roughly $2 trillion in total crypto market capitalization, according to CoinDesk reporting.
The timing was pointed: the DOL's proposed rule had been submitted to OIRA just three weeks earlier, on January 13. Critics argued the crash provided a real-time demonstration of the fiduciary risks they had warned about.
According to CoinDesk, BlockTrust IRA—an AI-powered retirement platform that had accumulated $70 million in IRA funds over the prior 12 months—was caught in the decline. The firm's Chief Technical Officer acknowledged they "did not exit quickly enough because underlying fundamental data still looked strong."
GAO simulation data adds context. The December 2024 report found that a hypothetical 401(k) portfolio with a 20% Bitcoin allocation exhibited "notably higher volatility" compared to portfolios with 1% or 5% allocations. The simulations suggested that even small allocations—while enhancing returns during bull markets—meaningfully increased portfolio drawdown risk during bear cycles.
Financial advisors surveyed by CoinDesk Indices in February 2026 recommended limiting crypto to 1%–5% of total portfolio allocation. A "balanced" model portfolio cited by CoinDesk consisted of 2% Bitcoin, 3% tokenized bonds, and the remainder in traditional equities and fixed income.
The regulatory sequence has three remaining stages:
Publication. EBSA publishes the proposed rule in the Federal Register. No date has been announced, but industry observers expect publication within weeks of the March 24 OIRA clearance.
Comment period. A 60-day public comment window opens. Banks, consumer advocacy groups, industry associations, plan sponsors, and members of Congress will submit formal feedback. Based on the political intensity of the topic, a high volume of comments is expected.
Final rule. DOL reviews comments, potentially revises the rule, and publishes a final version. This process typically takes 6–12 months but can extend depending on the volume and substance of comments received.
If the rule survives the comment period without major revisions, plan sponsors could begin formally adding crypto and alternative asset options to their 401(k) menus in late 2026 or early 2027. Practical adoption, however, will depend on recordkeepers, custodians, and insurers building the infrastructure to support these options—a process that introduces its own timeline.
Meanwhile, the crypto IRA market (self-directed, not employer-sponsored) continues to develop in parallel. Fidelity launched a crypto IRA product, and providers such as Swan Bitcoin, iTrustCapital, and BitcoinIRA operate in this adjacent space. According to Retirement Living, crypto IRA assets remain a small fraction of the $15.5 trillion IRA market but are growing as regulatory clarity improves.
OIRA cleared the proposed DOL rule on March 24, 2026, marking it "consistent with change" and "economically significant." Publication for public comment is expected within weeks.
$14.2 trillion in DC plan assets fall under the potential scope of this rule. Actual 401(k) crypto adoption remains below 1% of plan investments, per GAO data.
The rule is a liability shield, not a mandate. It provides a fiduciary framework for plan sponsors who choose to include crypto, not a requirement to do so.
Only two providers (Fidelity and ForUsAll) currently offer in-plan crypto access. Neither has disclosed meaningful adoption metrics.
Bitcoin's ~50% decline from its October peak and the resulting $2 trillion market cap erasure provided opponents with a real-time stress test for their arguments.
Senator Warren, the GAO, and the EPI have each published formal critiques of the policy direction, citing volatility, valuation risk, oversight gaps, and lack of investor protections.
Final implementation timeline: If the comment period proceeds on schedule, a final rule could arrive in late 2026 or early 2027. Practical adoption will lag further as infrastructure develops.
The OIRA clearance on March 24 moved the largest potential capital reallocation in U.S. retirement plan history one step closer to reality. The numbers are unambiguous: $10.1 trillion in 401(k) assets, sub-1% current crypto adoption, and a proposed rule designed to close the liability gap that has kept those two figures from converging.
Whether they should converge is the central policy question. The DOL's position under the current administration is clear—fiduciaries, not regulators, should make investment decisions. Critics counter that the $2 trillion February crash demonstrates precisely why regulatory guardrails exist.
The 60-day comment period, once opened, will be the most consequential public input window in the history of digital assets in the United States. Every major bank, asset manager, consumer advocacy organization, and crypto firm will submit comments. The final rule's contours—allocation limits, disclosure requirements, custody standards, and valuation methodologies—will be shaped by that process.
For now, the gap between $14.2 trillion in addressable assets and less than 1% actual adoption tells the story: this is a market defined by latent demand, unresolved liability risk, and a regulatory framework that is still being written.