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Spirit Airlines Pilot Retirement Savings Plan
Pension plan for Spirit Airlines pilots; sponsor ceased operations May 2026. Administered with Charles Schwab.
Spirit Airlines Pilot Retirement Savings Plan
The Spirit Airlines Pilot Retirement Savings Plan operates as a single-employer defined-contribution plan providing individual participant accounts. Contributions flow from both Spirit Airlines pilots and the airline itself. The plan administrator is Spirit Airlines, with Charles Schwab serving as recordkeeper — a standard 401(k) architecture common among US carriers. Specific investment-lineup data, total assets under management, and participant count remain unpublished. The plan's parent sponsor, Spirit Airlines, ceased all operations on May 2, 2026, initiating an orderly wind-down effective immediately (per the firm, May 2026). This termination of the sponsor's business leaves the plan's future status — including blackout periods, distribution options, and potential termination — unresolved in the public record. No regulatory filings detail the plan's current asset allocation or funded status. The plan's sole known operating relationship is with Charles Schwab as custody and recordkeeping provider. No co-investment vehicles, affiliated foundations, or advisory boards are publicly associated with the plan. The airline's ultra-low-cost-carrier business model served over 60 destinations across the United States, Caribbean, and Latin America, but the plan itself discloses no geographic investment concentrations. The plan's structural distinctiveness lies in its abrupt orphan status: a frozen or terminating pension vehicle for a sponsor that has disintegrated operationally. Most peer airline plans remain attached to going concerns, making this plan a case study in post-sponsor-failure retirement administration. How fiduciary oversight and participant communications will be handled during and after the wind-down — given the airline's removal of all customer contact infrastructure — remains the defining, unanswered structural question.
General information
Firm type
Pension Fund
Year founded
—
AUM
Undisclosed
Location
Region
North America
Country
United States
City
Miramar
Corporate office
Miramar, FL, United States
Frequently asked questions
What happens to the Spirit Airlines Pilot Retirement Savings Plan now that the sponsor has ceased operations?
When a plan sponsor terminates operations but the plan retains assets, participants typically face a period of administrative transition. Plan fiduciaries must determine whether to terminate the plan, distribute assets, or merge it into another qualified plan. The plan's 401(k) and profit-sharing structure means assets are held in individual accounts, which generally remain the property of participants even if the sponsor dissolves. However, no public filings or statements from Spirit Airlines or Charles Schwab have clarified the specific path for this plan as of mid-2026.
Who administers the plan's day-to-day recordkeeping?
Charles Schwab serves as the plan's recordkeeper and custodian, providing the platform through which participants manage their individual accounts. Spirit Airlines acts as plan sponsor and administrator. With the sponsor's operational wind-down, the ongoing division of administrative responsibilities between Schwab and any remaining fiduciary entity has not been publicly detailed.
What type of retirement plan is this?
It is a defined-contribution plan encompassing both a 401(k) feature and a profit-sharing component. Participants accumulate individual account balances funded by employee deferrals and employer contributions. This structure differs from a defined-benefit pension, where the employer guarantees a specific retirement income stream.
Does the plan disclose its investment lineup or asset allocation?
No. The specific investment options — mutual funds, collective trusts, target-date funds, or self-directed brokerage — have not been publicly disclosed. Charles Schwab's standard institutional platform includes a range of core fund families, but the plan's actual menu is unknown without participant-level documents or Form 5500 filings.
How does the plan's wind-down context compare to other airline pension failures?
Unlike legacy defined-benefit airline plans terminated in bankruptcy and transferred to the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation, this is a defined-contribution plan. That means there is no PBGC insurance backstop for asset shortfalls. The primary risk is not underfunding but administrative paralysis — participants may face difficulties obtaining distributions or rolling over assets if the sponsor's fiduciary infrastructure dissolves without a clear successor.
Profile maintained by Altss using OSINT (open-source intelligence), regulatory filings, licensed data partners, and verified direct submissions. Read the methodology. Last updated: . Continuous refresh with full update cycles at least every 30 days.
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