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Assets in life-cycle funds have more than doubled since 2000, and they grew 38% in December 2004, to $139.7 billion, from $101.4 billion in 2003. Assets in lifestyle funds rose 28%, to $95.8 billion, while those in target retirement funds jumped 65%, to $43.9 billion.
According to a Hewitt Associates study, the percentage of corporate retirement plans that offer lifestyle funds is also growing, to 55% of plans in 2004 from 35% in 2001. Far more 401(k) participants, 81%, had access to life-cycle funds than to target retirement funds (19%) partly because fewer companies offer them. But "people are coming out more with retirement funds because they remove need for deciding when to shift to another lifestyle fund," says Michael Porter, a senior research analyst at Lipper and co-author of the study.
Life-cycle funds solve a lot of problems faced by 401(k) participants, according to Porter. "A large majority of investors have neither the time nor the inclination nor the expertise to plan for their retirement and this is a turnkey kind of investment for them," he says. The funds not only provide professional diversification, but also regularly rebalance the allocation, something most 401(k) participants don't do.
These funds of funds have drawbacks, too. For one, most charge a fee on top of the expenses of the underlying funds. And since life-cycle funds are composed of offerings from the same family, they may not be the best options in each asset class. Finally, the allocations and risk/reward profiles vary dramatically from one life-cycle fund to another. And because the underlying managers act independently from each other, there may be considerable overlap among fund assets.
By far the largest share of the life-cycle funds market, 34.2%, belongs to Fidelity and Vanguard, 17.2%. Other companies, such as Frank Russell and T. Rowe Price, have no more than 4.2% of the market.
