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https://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-department-labor-issues-401k-guidelines-private-assets-2026-03-30/
> March 30 (Reuters) - The Trump administration on Monday issued a long-awaited proposed rule to open up retirement plans to alternative assets, paving the way for private equity and cryptocurrencies to be added to 401(k) accounts.
> The measure, announced by the U.S. Department of Labor, is intended to ease longstanding barriers to incorporating these less liquid and less transparent assets into American retirement plans. It follows an executive order from President Donald Trump last summer and could clear the way for alternative asset management firms to tap a large new source of capital.
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> The guidance lays out how plan trustees, who have a legal fiduciary duty to act in the best interest of members, can incorporate these assets.
> They would have to "objectively, thoroughly, and analytically consider, and make determinations on factors including performance, fees, liquidity, valuation, performance benchmarks, and complexity," the DOL said.
> **Trustees who abide by them will be granted safe harbor that protects them from lawsuits, it added.** The Supreme Court agreed earlier this year to hear one such case filed in 2019 by a former Intel employee claiming trustees made "imprudent" decisions by investing in hedge funds and private equity funds.
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For those that aren't already aware, many private credit funds have been seeing massive redemption requests and predictably slammed shut their gates to limit the withdraw rates.
Moody's downgraded some of the private credit funds as junk rating: https://www.cnbc.com/2026/03/24/moodys-private-credit-fund-kkr-future-standard-junk.html
> Moody’s Ratings on Monday downgraded a private credit fund run by KKR and Future Standard to junk amid rising bad loans and a string of weak earnings.
> The ratings firm lowered the debt ratings of FS KKR Capital Corp by one notch to Ba1 from Baa3 — pushing it into “junk” territory — saying that the fund’s underlying asset quality had worsened more than its peers.
> Non-accrual loans, meaning loans that borrowers have stopped making payments on, rose to 5.5% of total investments at the end of 2025, one of the highest rates among rated business development companies, according to the report.