Allstate Defeats Lawsuit Over 401(k) Plan’s Northern Trust Funds

Allstate Corp. workers challenging the Northern Trust target date funds in their 401(k) plan failed to show that these funds were objectively imprudent, a federal judge said Monday, tossing the case.

Judge Georgia N. Alexakis of the US District Court for the Northern District of Illinois awarded the insurance company summary judgment over the workers’ proposed class claims, saying the expert witness the workers tapped to discuss the funds’ shortcomings “admitted to not having any opinions as to the objective reasonableness” of Allstate’s decision to keep the investments in the plan.

Although the Northern Trust funds often underperformed on certain ...