Trump Accounts auto-enrollment begins: US Treasury to create investment accounts for 60 million children

The US Treasury Department has begun automatically enrolling children in the Trump Accounts child-investment programme, a rule change the agency says will create accounts for more than 60 million additional children in 2026 alone.

Temporary regulations issued jointly by the Treasury and the IRS were published in the Federal Register on Wednesday, 30 September, and take effect immediately. Automatic enrollment begins on 1 October 2026, replacing the opt-in system in which parents or guardians had to file IRS Form 4547 through the Trump Accounts app or their tax return. The accounts — formally 530A accounts — were created under President Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill tax and spending law, and the programme launched on 4 July.

Take-up under the opt-in system had been weak. The Wall Street Journal reported the Treasury had processed 5.6 million sign-up forms by the end of July against an estimated 73.4 million eligible children. A Commonwealth analysis found only 5% of low- and moderate-income households had opened an account. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, who teased the change at a House Financial Services Committee hearing earlier in September, expects automatic enrollment to add about 2 million accounts per birth-year group of eligible children.

Crucially, automatic enrollment does not trigger the one-time $1,000 federal seed contribution for children born between 1 January 2025 and 31 December 2028 — a parent must still specifically elect to receive it. Until claimed through a Treasury app or website, auto-created accounts can receive only government or nonprofit contributions; once claimed, families and employers can add up to $5,000 a year, invested in low-cost index funds of mostly US stocks and generally locked until the child turns 18.

The rules say “eligible donors prefer that their contributions reach all children, not just children whose parents have the awareness to opt in” — a design point aimed at big pledges such as Michael and Susan Dell’s $6.25 billion commitment. “This is the most important design change since the law passed,” said Jin Huang, a social policy professor at Washington University in St. Louis. “This is huge.”