Conversation with Former SEC Chief Economist Dr. Jessica Wachter on Investment Management Rulemaking at the Commission – PE Pathways
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PODCAST: Williams Mullen's Benefits Companion - Plan Administrators’ 2022 Year-End Checklist
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PODCAST: Williams Mullen's Benefits Companion - Helping Employers Address the Gender Gap in Retirement Savings
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2022 Resolutions: What Healthcare Practices Need To Tackle In the New Year
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On 7 August 2025, President Trump signed an executive order intended to modernize the 401(k) investment universe, directing the Secretary of Labor to clarify the US Department of Labor’s (DOL) position on fiduciary duties in...more
Word on the street is that President Trump plans to issue an executive order promoting private equity and other private investments in 401(k) plans. While he can’t mandate it, he can certainly nudge it, and that’s exactly...more
On August 7, 2025, the Trump administration issued an executive order directing federal agencies to broaden retirement plan participants’ access to alternative assets—including cryptocurrency, private equity, private credit,...more
President Trump has issued an Executive Order (EO) that could reshape how alternative assets are treated in defined contribution retirement plans. The directive requires the Department of Labor (DOL) to revisit its past...more
On August 12, 2025, the DOL issued a press release (the “Release”) announcing that it is rescinding its prior guidance regarding the use of alternative assets as an investment option under a 401(k) plan’s investment menu....more
The Trump administration is moving quickly to implement the president’s Aug. 7 executive order (EO) to expand retirement savers’ access to alternative investments in private markets through defined contribution (DC) plans,...more
On August 7, 2025, President Trump issued an executive order titled “Democratizing Access to Alternative Assets for 401(k) Investors.” The order seeks to clarify the obligations of Employee Retirement Income Security Act...more
This episode of PE Pathways features Dr. Jessica Wachter, former chief economist and director of the Division of Economic and Risk Analysis at the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), now a professor in quantitative...more
On August 12, the U.S. Department of Labor’s Employee Benefits Security Administration rescinded guidance from December 2021 that discouraged fiduciaries from considering alternative assets in the list of investment options...more
On August 7, President Donald Trump issued an executive order directing federal agencies, particularly the Department of Labor, to work on expanding access to alternative investments for participants in 401(k) and other...more
What You Need to Know - The Trump Administration has shifted away from Biden-era rules related to certain investments, like alternative asset investments, ESG, and cryptocurrency in 401(k) plans....more
President Donald Trump on Aug. 7, 2025, signed an executive order (EO), "Democratizing Access for 401(k) Investors," and published a related fact sheet. The EO expresses the policy of the Trump Administration that "every...more
A hotly anticipated August 7, 2025, executive order, "Democratizing Access to Alternative Assets for 401(k) Investors" ("EO"), aims to reduce regulatory barriers and significantly expand access to "alternative...more
Participants in 401(k) plans and other defined contribution retirement plans may soon have the opportunity to invest their plan accounts in a variety of high-risk and potentially high-return assets. Touted as an effort to...more
On August 7, 2025, President Donald Trump signed an Executive Order titled “Democratizing Access to Alternative Assets for 401(k) Investors” (the “Order”), which encourages the US Department of Labor (“DOL”) and other federal...more
On August 7, 2025, President Trump signed an executive order titled “Democratizing Access to Alternative Assets for 401(k) Investors,” designed to open the use of alternative investments, including private equity and actively...more
On August 7, 2025, the Trump Administration issued a long-awaited executive order (the “Executive Order”) to encourage sponsors of 401(k) and other participant-directed defined-contribution plans that are governed by the...more
Under the current administration, the Department of Labor has once again changed course on its view of permissible investing strategies for retirement plans, warming to crypto and private equity, and confirming their distrust...more
On Friday, July 4, President Trump signed into law the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (H.R. 1) (“Big Beautiful Bill”) after narrow approval from both houses of Congress. The legislation extends the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act and...more
Well, that didn’t take long. In what’s becoming a routine political tug-of-war, the Trump administration (yes, back again) has rescinded the Biden-era Department of Labor (DOL) guidance cautioning plan sponsors against...more
On May 28, 2025, the US Department of Labor (the “Labor Department”) issued Compliance Assistance Release No. 2025-01 (the “2025 Release”), memorializing the Labor Department’s decision to rescind Compliance Release No....more
In our recent client alert, “Texas Federal Court Allows an ERISA Fiduciary Challenge Against Alleged “ESG Investing” Without Any ESG Funds,” we reported that a Texas district court recently upheld Biden-administration...more
On May 28, 2025, the U.S. Department of Labor (“DOL”) began to articulate the Trump administration’s retirement policy priorities with its decisions to (i) end its defense of the Biden-era ESG rule in a long-running lawsuit...more
On May 28, 2025, the U.S. Department of Labor (“DOL”) provided updated guidance on two employee benefit plan-related investment areas: (1) cryptocurrency and (2) environmental, social, and governance (“ESG”) investing....more
3 Under the Biden Administration, the Department of Labor ("DOL") had issued a rule that permitted ESG factors to be considered when making investments on behalf of 401(k) plans. (This rule had replaced an earlier one from...more