Fidelity’s average retirement account balances dropped — the reason why may surprise you

A year ago, people were talking about being 401K millionaires as many accounts crossed the million dollar level.

What a difference a year makes. The carnage that was the stock market in 2018 left many of these accounts moving in the opposite direction. The 4th quarter, in particular was ravaged.

This had an impact on 401K accounts. Vanguard released the numbers and it reflected this.

The average account balance dropped to $95,600 from $106,500 in the 3rd quarter. This is a fairly significant drop in one quarter.

Other numbers mentioned was that about 1/5th had loan balances, the lowest level since 2009. We also see 9.4% of workers initiated loans.

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