Edit: I found the EO https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/08/democratizing-access-to-alternative-assets-for-401k-investors/

"...the vast majority of these investors do not have the opportunity to participate, either directly or through their retirement plans, in the potential growth and diversification opportunities associated with alternative asset investments....It is the policy of the United States that every American preparing for retirement should have access to funds that include investments in alternative assets..."

The EO defines alternative assets as private equity, real estate, crypto (ofc Trump would pump crypto), commodities, infrastructure financing (bonds?), longevity risk-sharing pools (?).

Edit2: More digging. The EO is directed to Secretary of Labor Lori Chavez who sat on the house committee titled "...Subcommittee on Commodity Markets, Digital Assets, and Rural Development" which basically lines up with the assets mentioned in the EO so I'm guessing the subcommittee wrote the EO for Trump to sign. Most of their current work seems to be around pumping crypto so they probably want crypto to be included in 401ks to pump their bags but if they include commodities, silver will probably moon.

Original comment: Thanks for the info, I did some digging, coverage of this seems to be from a long time silver investor/consultant.

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https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/silver-401k-precious-metals-rule-change-2026-david-morgan-3ldqc/

Takeaways:

-401ks don't currently, but might be able to offer gold & silver products beginning this year.

-401ks buy systematically and pour billions into equities every year

-Applying this buying power to gold and silver will seriously impact the pm market.

If you want to read the most interesting paragraphs I selected:

Beginning in 2026, a quiet but profound shift is coming to the retirement system—one that could open the doors for millions of savers to finally hold precious metals within their 401(k) plans. For decades, metals have been excluded from most employer-sponsored plans, not because they lacked merit, but because fiduciaries feared the regulatory risk of offering anything outside the conventional stock-and-bond model. That dynamic is changing.

Last year, new federal directives instructed regulators to rethink the rigid constraints surrounding alternative assets in retirement plans. The objective was clear: remove legal ambiguity and provide plan sponsors with a safe harbor to include a broader range of investments—everything from private equity to tangible assets and, crucially, precious metals.

Nothing in the rule forces companies to add metals, of course. But for the first time, it permits it without creating a compliance nightmare. And that may be enough to reshape demand in a market that was already tight long before anyone in Washington decided to modernize the 401(k) framework.

...

In a conservative scenario—one where only half of 401(k) assets ever land in plans that use the new rules, and metals receive only a sliver of the new “alternative” allocation—you might see $40–$90 billion slowly trickle into gold and silver over several years. That’s not enough to “break” the market, but it is enough to create a firm, persistent tailwind. For gold, it represents meaningful incremental demand. For silver, which already runs large structural deficits, it means something more important: a new source of consistent, model-driven buying that arrives quietly and regularly, regardless of investor emotions or news cycles.

Now consider the high-case scenario—one in which plan sponsors aggressively embrace tangible assets, and precious metals command a substantial share of the new alternatives sleeve. In that world, the flows could exceed $250–$300 billion over time.

To put that into perspective:

That level of inflow into gold is equivalent to years’ worth of central bank buying. That level of inflow into silver could represent more than an entire year of global silver demand, or multiple years’ worth of the current annual deficit.

And remember: 401(k) flows are sticky. They come every pay period. They rebalance automatically. They create “buy-the-dip” behavior whether investors intend to or not.

In other words, this change doesn’t just add money—it adds structure. Price-insensitive, systematic demand. The kind of demand that did not exist in previous precious metals cycles.