At a glance
- A family that puts the $5,000 annual maximum into a Trump Account from birth and adds $7,500 a year to a traditional IRA through age 65 ends up with roughly $4.1 million.
- Trump Accounts are federal savings accounts for children under 18, launched in July.
- Nancy DeRusso, Guardian's head of client solutions, put it in foundation terms.
Guardian Life Insurance Co. of America has a new report, “Next-Gen Wealth: New Opportunities for Families and Business Owners,” and its math starts at birth. A family that puts the $5,000 annual maximum into a Trump Account from birth and adds $7,500 a year to a traditional IRA through age 65 ends up with roughly $4.1 million. Guardian assumes a 7% net return; PLANADVISER reported the projection.
Trump Accounts are federal savings accounts for children under 18, launched in July. Guardian sees them pulling family planning earlier, from milestone-based planning to accumulation that lets a longer horizon do the work. The report argues the accounts complement rather than replace retirement accounts, and that advisors should weigh them alongside 529 plans, trusts, and custodial accounts, each with different tax benefits and flexibility.
Nancy DeRusso, Guardian's head of client solutions, put it in foundation terms. “Effective wealth management starts with a strong foundation. From that base, individuals can pursue opportunities to grow, transfer, and preserve wealth with greater confidence.”
A separate white paper starts at the other end. Bquest, an end-of-life planning platform for advisors, published “Retirement Planning is Broken: Why Longer Lives Require the Next Evolution of Financial Advice.” It argues that a plan built only around avoiding portfolio depletion leaves gaps in longevity, healthcare needs, and caregiving, the areas traditional planning neglects. PLANADVISER covered that paper too.
Read together, the two reports describe an industry conversation about whether planning should run from a child's savings through the years after work. For an advisor, the opportunity is to connect those two ends in one client conversation rather than two separate practices.
The Guardian report's title pairs families with business owners, and the pairing is deliberate. A meeting that opens a child's account is a natural place to ask who gets the operating company and when. A Trump Account does not answer succession, but it starts the family conversation about the next generation, often the harder part.
The accounts are already drawing rulemaking attention. Wealth Advisor Daily this week reported proposed rules that would let employers contribute to Trump Accounts, adding a second route beyond family checks. If employer contributions become a standard benefit, advisors will be explaining the accounts to a much wider group of clients.
For a practice, the two reports frame one conversation that spans account types. The play is to make the next generation a standing item in the annual review: whether the 529 is in place, whether a Trump Account makes sense, who contributes, and what the plan is after retirement. Guardian's math is an illustration, not a promise — it assumes full annual contributions and a 7% net return. The exact number is less important than having a concrete opening to talk about wealth before the client's children are old enough to earn a paycheck.
Bquest's paper is the reminder that the same conversation has to cover the last years as well as the first. An account opened for a child in 2026 may still be in the family when caregiving decisions arise. The advisory firm that holds both ends of that timeline owns the relationship.
Reported by the Practice management desk from PLANADVISER. Published . Corrections