The coming year may be an inflection point for retirement planning.

The US population is aging rapidly, with the share of Americans aged 65 and older projected to climb steadily over the coming decades. Traditional pensions aren’t making a comeback either (quite the opposite), but the good news is that there is a new generation of asset classes that may help provide some of the retirement security that savers had enjoyed during the pension era, according to the latest report from the annuity and retirement services provider Athene. New strategies in private assets could also help advisors guide clients toward better retirement outcomes.

“A financial advisor can really shine by not letting go of the upside opportunity that their customers have, but providing a lot of protection at the same time,” said Mike Downing, an author of the report and Athene’s co-president. “Retirement savers have been saving, but not quite enough.”

Demographics Meet Market Risk

Two main risks loom large for retirees heading into 2026, according to the Athene report. The first is market concentration: With a handful of mega-cap technology stocks accounting for more than a third of the S&P 500’s value, an AI-driven equity correction would ripple quickly through portfolios that are already strongly linked to the index. The second risk is inflation. Whether driven by policy shifts or interest rate changes, shrinking purchasing power would hit retirees hardest, given their reliance on fixed or semi-fixed income streams. “Interest rates have been pretty volatile. There’s no clear path going forward,” Downing told Advisor Upside. “And there’s 12,000 new [retirees] coming in, reaching age 65, every day.”

The timing is ominous, with many prospective retirees not well prepared. According to the report:

• There is a $4 trillion “savings gap” between what Americans in the aggregate should have saved for retirement and what they currently have saved.
• Less than 10% of Americans’ overall wealth comes from pensions, on average.

The Growing Role of Private Assets. Private equity and private credit are also now being integrated into retirees’ plans. US pensions already hold 25% or more of assets in private markets, according to the study, but for everyday retirement savers, exposure has historically been near zero. That gap is narrowing as platforms evolve, Downing added.

“Other tools that were available at very high net worth [levels]… there’s been this kind of democratization of those, looking for ways to make those more accessible for savers by creating different products that can be utilized by more day-to-day investors,” Downing said. “So not just the ultra high net worth, but mass affluent investors, as well.”

Some places never close — casinos, convenience stores, Waffle Houses — and soon, the New York Stock Exchange might join them.

NYSE and its parent company, Intercontinental Exchange, are developing a blockchain-based platform that would allow 24/7 trading of tokenized US equities and ETFs, pending regulatory approval. “Supporting tokenized securities is a pivotal step in ICE’s strategy to operate on-chain market infrastructure for trading, settlement, custody and capital formation in the new era of global finance,” Michael Blaugrund, ICE’s vice president of strategic initiatives, said in a statement.

The move could fundamentally change how trading works, but it’s not yet clear whether it will offer a real advantage or just endless hours of marginal activity, like streaming services with thousands of shows when all we really want to watch is NCIS and Bluey.

Building Blockchain

Tokenized securities are digital representations of traditional assets — stocks, ETFs, real estate, commodities and more. They promise faster trade execution and greater liquidity. As of last fall, roughly $24 billion in real-world assets were tokenized on blockchains. Analysts expect that to surge, with British multinational bank Standard Chartered projecting $30 trillion in tokenized assets by 2034.

A handful of firms are leading the charge to create them:

• BlackRock, WisdomTree and Franklin Templeton have begun tokenizing money market funds and mutual funds.
• Meanwhile, platforms like Robinhood and Kraken have tokenized hundreds of US stocks and ETFs for foreign investors.

Time is Never Time at All: In addition to the token platform, NYSE plans to operate Arca, its fully electronic exchange, 22 hours a day on weekdays. Nasdaq, meanwhile, is seeking regulatory approval for 23-hour trading with a short maintenance pause.

However, most activity will probably still occur during regular hours, and FINRA warns of lower liquidity and higher volatility outside normal sessions. The World Economic Forum says questions remain, including, “How will daily volume be measured?” and “What defines opening or closing prices?”

Lucas Wennersten, founder of 49th Parallel Wealth Management, said tokens and extended trading hours could bring benefits such as more products and lower costs. But he also warned of downsides. “Tokenized assets could prove harder to regulate, increasing fraud, money laundering, terrorism financing, and other illicit activities,” he told Advisor Upside, adding that unlimited trading hours could render safeguards like circuit breakers ineffective.

Everyday investors aren’t funnelling their savings into meme stocks. Instead, they put a record amount of money into stocks and exchange-traded funds (ETFs) last year. The winners of that trend? Large fund managers, of course.

Schwab and its rivals like Fidelity Investments and Vanguard may no longer get the trading fees they collected before Robinhood helped usher in the zero-commission era, but apparently, they don’t need them. Schwab’s trading revenue jumped 22% from the fourth quarter of 2024, and its net interest revenue surged 25%. The firm reported $158.2 billion in total new assets for the last quarter of 2025.

While net revenue of $6.34 billion came in lower than the $6.37 billion analysts were expecting, it’s clear that Schwab is riding the high of the record inflows mom-and-pop investors put to work.

Forever Young

Everyday investors closed 2025 with inflows that were nearly twice the five-year average, surpassing the previous record set in 2021 by almost 17% and skyrocketing past 2024’s figure by nearly 60%, JPMorgan analysts wrote in a note earlier this month.

Massive brokers saw the benefits. Schwab’s daily trading volume rose 31% year-over-year.

“We’re winning with all demographics,” Rick Wurster, president and CEO of Charles Schwab, told CNBC. “We’ve seen the young generation come to Schwab at record levels and get invested earlier than the prior generations … One-third of our new-to-firm clients last year were Gen Z investors, and the average age of our clients has actually come down by 10 years in the last decade.”

But to continue attracting those younger investors, they have to be open to changes:

• A 2024 Bank of America study found that 72% of high-net-worth investors ages 21 to 43 say it’s no longer possible to achieve above-average investment returns by investing solely in traditional stocks and bonds. They’re increasingly turning to alternative assets, such as crypto. Wurster said during the company’s earnings call that it’s on track to launch Bitcoin and Ethereum spot trading in the first half of this year.
• Offering access to the increasingly popular prediction markets, however, isn’t high on Schwab’s priority list at the moment. “I think there is a really bright line between gambling and investing,” Wurster told The Wall Street Journal in December. “The blending of those two is not a great thing.”

Financial Ecosystems: As more investors enter the market, they’re looking for advice on how to weather its ups and downs and manage their overall finances. As a result, major brokerages are transforming into financial ecosystems. Just take Robinhood, which grew from a platform for investors to trade stocks and ETFs into one that offers private wealth management, traditional FDIC-insured bank accounts and mortgage lending via partnerships. Meanwhile, Wurster said in a statement that “clients are conducting more of their financial lives at Schwab, with record engagement across wealth management, trading and banking.”