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Aflac 401(k) retirement plan: the investment options

Does your 401(k) vote the way you would? $574m of the $1.06bn in the Aflac plan votes in secret. Fidelity 500 Index Fund, the most common fund in the plans we track, publishes every vote: answer 3 of its ballots, then see your result.

The question on the ballot

As filed

Aflac 401(k) match and balances, from the filing

Company money in
about $7,230 per active participant
$42m in plan year 2024
Employees saved
about $7,700 each
$44m in plan year 2024
Average balance
$154,500
6,890 people with a balance
In the plan
$1.06bn
at the end of plan year 2024

Company money is the match plus any other employer contributions, averaged over all 5,776 active participants, including anyone who did not contribute. The filing reports dollars, not the match formula; the plan’s summary plan description states the formula.

SourceThe plan’s annual report to the Department of Labor — Form 5500, Schedule H, plan year 2024 · filed by AFLAC INCORPORATED as “AFLAC INCORPORATED 401(K) SAVINGS AND PROFIT SHARING PLAN” · EIN 581167100, plan number 004 · search the filings

The Aflac 401(k) holds $1.06bn. Of the $574m we could identify from the plan’s own filing, every dollar sits in a fund that publishes no record of how it voted your shares — collective trusts, which unlike a mutual fund file no Form N-PX and leave no public trace of a single vote.

SourceAflac’s own annual retirement-plan filing with the SEC (Form 11-K, Schedule of Assets) · open the filing

What the plan holdsVehicleVoting recordValue
Aflac Incorporated common stock* Employer stock Voted by the plan trustee $195m
Fidelity Balanced Fund* Not identified from the filing Not counted either way $112m
Spartan 500 Index Pool Class C Collective trust or separate account NONE $108m
JPMorgan Large Cap Growth Fund, R6 Not identified from the filing Not counted either way $85m
T. Rowe Price Retirement Blend 2040 Trust Class B Collective trust or separate account NONE $62m
T. Rowe Price Retirement Blend 2045 Trust Class B Collective trust or separate account NONE $58m
T. Rowe Price Retirement Blend 2035 Trust Class B Collective trust or separate account NONE $53m
T. Rowe Price Retirement Blend 2050 Trust Class B Collective trust or separate account NONE $52m
T. Rowe Price Retirement Blend 2030 Trust Class B Collective trust or separate account NONE $51m
Vanguard Equity Income Fund, Admiral Not identified from the filing Not counted either way $37m
T. Rowe Price Retirement Blend 2025 Trust Class B Collective trust or separate account NONE $31m
T. Rowe Price Retirement Blend 2055 Trust Class B Collective trust or separate account NONE $28m

The 12 largest holdings in the plan. “Vehicle” is the description the filing itself gives each investment.

Why there is nothing to show

A mutual fund has to file Form N-PX every year listing every vote it cast on your behalf. A collective investment trust does not. It is a bank-run vehicle sold only inside retirement plans, it is cheaper, and it is now where most 401(k) default money sits — including most target-date funds, which is where savers who never chose anything are put.

So the shares bought with Aflac employees’ retirement savings are voted every proxy season — on executive pay, on board seats, on climate and workforce proposals — and there is no public document anywhere recording how. This is not an oversight by Aflac; it is what the disclosure rules currently require, which is to say: nothing.

What you can do

Check whether your plan offers any registered fund as an alternative — those publish their records, and you can read them here. If it does not, the menu itself is the thing that has to change, and that is a decision made by the plan’s fiduciary committee, not by you alone.

See how funds that do publish voted →

CoverageWe classified 75.6% of this plan’s assets from the filing. The figure above is the share of the money we could classify; anything we could not identify is excluded from it rather than assumed either way.

Other employer plans

The largest employer plans on the site, and a few more. Each page shows what the plan’s funds did with the shares its savers paid for.

Microsoft 401(k)$64.92bn in the planBank of America 401(k)248,103 savers · $62.90bnJPMorgan Chase 401(k)297,359 savers · $52.91bnGoogle 401(k)154,637 savers · $48.74bnWells Fargo 401(k)$43.80bn in the planAmazon 401(k)943,213 savers · $34.59bnInternational Business Machines 401(k)$28.25bn in the planIntel 401(k)$26.91bn in the planWoodside Energy Usa Services 401(k)2,259 savers · $1.21bnSummit Healthcare Management 401(k)2,162 savers · $24mSelectquote 401(k)2,513 savers · $140mGibraltar Industries 401(k)$376m in the planNature Conservancy 401(k)6,514 savers · $1.26bnCCC Group 401(k)1,007 savers · $30m