President Trump heralded the start of his savings accounts for children by ringing the stock market’s opening bell in an Oval Office ceremony on Monday.
The Trump accounts, as they are known, are being seeded with a one-time $1,000 deposit from the Treasury Department for children with a Social Security number born from Jan. 1, 2025, to Dec. 31, 2028.
The White House has predicted that the plan’s assets could grow to seven figures by the time the children are in their late 20s. On Monday, Mr. Trump credited the booming stock market under his presidency as one reason the accounts have so much potential, citing how high several market indexes have rallied since he took office.
“They can have a lot of money,” Mr. Trump told a group of reporters, administration officials and young children gathered in the Oval Office on Monday.
“It’s going to go up,” he added. “I think the market’s going to go through the roof.”
But the accounts, which are available to children under 18 and went live over the weekend, haven’t reached all eligible children yet. Children are not automatically enrolled in the plan, and their parents need to sign up for them on their tax forms. The Social Security Administration recently said parents could also sign newborns up for the account at hospitals, when they register their Social Security numbers. So far, only 1.4 million children in the age range have been signed up, or about one-quarter of eligible children.
Individuals, employers and others can deposit money into the accounts, which grow tax-free, like individual retirement accounts. The children gain access to that money only when they turn 18.
In his remarks, Mr. Trump thanked several donors for making contributions to the savings program, including Michael and Susan Dell, who invested $6.25 billion through their foundation, and the chip maker Micron, which Mr. Trump said would invest $250 million.
“Go out and buy a Dell computer,” Mr. Trump said, after thanking the Dells, who were standing next to him. “He’s not doing it for that, but I’ll bet his business brand has gotten even bigger.”
On Monday, Gwynne Shotwell, the president and chief operating officer of SpaceX, said that she and her husband had donated a portion of their stock in the rocket and A.I. company to more than two million Trump accounts. SpaceX, which held its initial public offering last month, relies partly on government contracts.
Monday’s ceremony was the first time that the opening bells for the New York Stock Exchange and Nasdaq were rung from the Oval Office.
Mr. Trump said the fund had been made possible by the passage of his landmark spending bill last year. He said that putting his name on the fund wasn’t his idea, but that he had been told it would “sell better” with it.
Many parents, however, are turned off by the attachment of Mr. Trump’s name to the plan, according to research by Commonwealth, a nonprofit that aims to help low-income people build wealth.
Ryan Mac contributed reporting.
