What is the retirement account (Altersvorsorgedepot)?

Flex and Standard will be available to customers aged 18 or over who live in Germany.

Opening an account does not automatically qualify you for state allowances. The Central Allowance Office for Retirement Savings (Zentrale Zulagenstelle für Altersvermögen (ZfA)) assesses allowance eligibility separately, based on your personal circumstances.

To open an AVD with Trading 212 and receive state allowances, you must meet the relevant eligibility conditions:

1. Are at least 18 years and under 70 years old; and
2. Belong to one of these groups:
   1. Employees and volunteers: Employees compulsorily insured in Germany’s statutory pension scheme; minijobbers who have not opted out of that scheme; artists and publicists compulsorily insured through the Artists’ Social Security system (“Künstlersozialversicherung”, “KSV”); and participants in the Federal Volunteer Service (“Bundesfreiwilligendienst”).
   2. Self-employed individuals and farmers: Self-employed individuals under 67 who file a tax return and have income under § 15 EStG (business owners) or § 18 EStG (freelancers and independent professionals); and farmers insured under the farmers’ old-age pension scheme (“Alterssicherung der Landwirte”).
   3. Civil servants and professional pension scheme members: Civil servants (“Beamte”), judges, professional soldiers and public-service pension recipients (“Versorgungsempfänger”); and members of professional pension schemes (“berufsständische Versorgungseinrichtungen”). Both groups must provide data-transfer consent. Professional pension scheme members must also be under 67.
   4. Parents and carers: Parents during recognised child-rearing periods (“Kindererziehungszeit”), statutorily limited to three years per child; and non-commercial carers who are compulsorily insured in the statutory pension scheme during their caregiving period.
   5. Benefit recipients and disability pensioners: Recipients of unemployment benefit (“ALG I”), sickness benefit (“Krankengeld”), injury benefit (“Verletztengeld”), sickness benefit under social compensation law (“Versorgungskrankengeld”) or transitional allowance (“Übergangsgeld”), provided they were compulsorily insured in the statutory pension scheme at some point in the calendar year before the benefit began. This group also includes recipients of full reduced-earning-capacity pensions (“Erwerbsminderungs-” or “Erwerbsunfähigkeitsrente”).
   6. Spouses and registered civil partners: indirect eligibility: Individuals who are not directly eligible under the groups above may qualify indirectly (“mittelbar”) through a directly eligible spouse or registered civil partner. To receive funding, they must open an AVD contract in their own name and contribute at least €120 per year. Their state allowance is capped at €175 per year under the new system.

Additional information on eligibility criteria can be found on the official German Ministry of Finance website here.

Eligibility has been expanded compared with Riester. For the first time, the self-employed and members of professional pension schemes get access to this type of state allowances on a capital-market retirement vehicle.

Yes - and you have three options to handle the move:

1. Option A: Start fresh: keep your Riester running and open a separate AVD in parallel, for example at Trading 212. Opening an AVD can affect the funding rules for your existing Riester contract.
2. Option B: Transfer to another provider, such as Trading 212: Your old provider sells your Riester investments and wires the cash balance to your new AVD. Allowances you've already earned stay with you.
3. Option C: Convert in place: stay with your state-subsidised private pension product (“Riester”) provider if they offer a conversion to AVD in January 2027.

Your AVD at Trading 212 is regulated on four independent levels:

1. State certification: every AVD product must be certified by the Federal Central Tax Office (“Bundeszentralamt für Steuern”, “BZSt”) before it can be sold. Trading 212's AVD is expected to carry this certification.
2. Regulated broker: Trading 212 operates as a licensed broker (“Wertpapierinstitut”) under German and European regulations, supervised by the Federal Financial Supervisory Authority (“Bafin”).
3. Your investments are segregated: the ETFs, funds and eligible financial instruments in your account are held separately from Trading 212's own assets. In the unlikely event of Trading 212 ceasing to operate, your investments would remain yours and accessible.
4. Your cash enjoys deposit protection: any uninvested cash in your AVD is held with one or more partner bank(s) and covered by that bank’s statutory deposit insurance up to €100,000 per customer.

State allowances are administered and audited by the Central Subsidy Office for Retirement Assets (“Zentrale Zulagenstelle für Altersvermögen”, “ZfA”) - an arm of the German Federal Pension Authority - so your allowances sit in a state-supervised flow.

No, you cannot transfer an existing Rürup pension (“Basisrente”) into a new AVD account. If you already have a Rürup contract, you can:

• Keep it running: Your existing Rürup contract will remain active and continue to benefit from its original tax-deductibility rules.
• Open an AVD in parallel: You can open up to two separate AVD alongside your Rürup contract to start taking advantage of the new state allowances (“Zulagen”) and the flexibility of the capital-market options.

No. The AVD is a separate certified retirement contract with its own eligible instrument universe and tax treatment. You will normally fund it with cash contributions or, where the rules will allow, a transfer from an eligible old retirement contract. Existing taxable Invest holdings stay in your regular securities account unless you decide separately to sell them and transfer the cash to the AVD.

Yes. A retirement savings depot invests in capital-market products, so the value can go down as well as up. State certification means the product meets legal certification requirements. It does not guarantee performance or protect you from market losses. A capital guarantee is a different product route and is not provided within a Trading 212 AVD account.

This applies to both Flex and Standard. Standard's automatic risk reduction does not guarantee your capital or a minimum return. You could get back less than you put in.

You can pause or change contributions. Your AVD is not automatically closed just because you miss a month. However, the state allowance for a contribution year is only available if you pay at least €120 of your own money in that year and meet the other eligibility conditions. If you pay less, you should expect no allowance for that year.

No. Flex and Standard are available only to customers in Germany. This is based on your country of residence, not your tax residency.

If you move abroad, you no longer meet the residency requirement for holding either account. Contact us to discuss the next steps. Your tax and allowance position must also be considered:

1. During the saving phase: you must update your address and tax residency. If you no longer belong to the eligible group, you should not expect new state allowances ("Zulagen") or German tax benefits for that period.
2. If you live in the EU/EEA: moving within the EU/EEA does not by itself trigger repayment of past allowances, but your eligibility and tax treatment still depend on your personal German tax and pension status.
3. If you retire outside the EU/EEA: from the start of the payout phase, German rules treat this as harmful use ("schädliche Verwendung"). This means state allowances and tax benefits received during the saving phase may have to be repaid.

Check out the official German Ministry of Finance page with more facts about the new retirement account (“Altersvorsorgedepot”) here.

Standard (“Standarddepot Altersvorsorge”) is the simpler option - a ready-made portfolio without individual investment decisions.

Three things make it different from a regular investment account:

1. Legal cost cap: all-in costs on Standard are capped at 1.0% per year by law. The cap applies to every Standard Depot regardless of provider; it does not apply to Flex.
2. Two-fund automatic structure: one safer fund and one growth-oriented fund. You decide how to split contributions; if you don't, a default split applies.
3. Auto-pilot lifecycle: in the 5 years before your payout date the share of growth assets is automatically capped at 50%; in the final 2 years it drops to at most 30%. You never have to manually rebalance.

If you'd rather build your own portfolio, you can choose Flex instead.

You choose between two separate account types:

• Standard (“Standarddepot Altersvorsorge”): the pre-built lifecycle portfolio (see above). No instrument picking on your side.
• Flex: you build the portfolio from the eligible funds and ETFs available in the account:
  • UCITS funds and ETFs (mainstream EU-regulated funds and ETFs)

The full range of eligible investments available in Flex will be confirmed before you open an account.

All risk-rated instruments are capped at risk class 5 on the standardised Basic information sheet (“Basisinformationsblatt”) (PRIIPs KID, scale 1-7).

What's not eligible inside an AVD: individual single stocks, leveraged products, derivatives, single high-risk instruments (risk class 6-7), and crypto.

Yes. From launch, you'll be able to hold one Flex account and one Standard account at the same time. Each is a separate retirement contract. You can hold at most two AVD contracts across all providers, and a third isn’t eligible for allowance.

Once registration opens, eligible customers will be able to:

1. New customers: choose Flex or Standard when signing up for your first Trading 212 account.
2. Existing customers: select Flex or Standard from the Account switcher or the More menu in the app and follow the account-opening steps. The new account will be added to your existing profile.

No. Flex and Standard won't offer demo accounts.

Not yet. The Trading 212 retirement savings depot ("Altersvorsorgedepot", AVD) is at pre-launch stage. Flex and Standard are expected to launch in January 2027. Until then, the website and in-app waitlist can help you learn about the product and register interest, but joining the waitlist is not a contract opening, allowance application or investment instruction.

You cannot open or fund a Flex or Standard account before launch. Account details may still change.

If you already use Trading 212 in Germany, you can join from your Invest, CFD or Crypto account. When Flex and Standard appear in your app:

1. Open the Account switcher or the More menu (the three-line button).
2. Select Flex or Standard to read the main account details.
3. Tap Join the waitlist.

You don't need to enter your email address. We'll use the email address linked to your Trading 212 account.

After joining, you'll see a confirmation saying “You’re on the list” and receive a confirmation email.

You only need to join once. When you return to Flex or Standard in the app, you'll see the same confirmation and won't be added again.

If joining fails, you'll see an error rather than a confirmation.

We'll send you a notification as soon as registration opens. You'll then be able to set up a Flex or Standard account straight from the app, subject to eligibility.

Newsletter updates are subject to your opt-in preferences. You can opt out using the link in each newsletter email.

No. Joining the in-app waitlist only registers your interest and does not include a bonus.

The website waitlist Reward Share/ Waitlist Bonus offer is separate. It is for eligible new customers who join the website waitlist before registering, then open and fund an Invest account, subject to the campaign terms.

Yes. You can join in the app too, and your website waitlist registration will stay in place. Joining in the app does not change your eligibility for the website waitlist reward or give you an extra bonus.

You won't receive the same waitlist emails twice just because you've joined through both routes.

You can prepare the details the app is likely to need: German tax ID, current tax residency, employment or pension-status information, child allowance details (if relevant), spouse eligibility details (if relevant), and information about any existing state-subsidised private pension product ("Riester") contracts (if any). Do not cancel or transfer an existing contract just because AVD is coming. The final product documents and opening flow will be available when the product is ready.

No. A waitlist or interest registration only tells us that you want updates. It does not reserve a state allowance ("Zulage"), create an AVD contract or lock in fees, funds or tax treatment. Before you can open the product, Trading 212 will show the certified product details and the Product Information Sheet ("Produktinformationsblatt") when it becomes available.

The calculator on this page shows a 7% nominal annual return projection for the growth-oriented portion of your portfolio. This figure is:

1. A long-term simplified historical average for diversified global equity ETFs net of fund costs
2. Illustrative only - actual returns could be higher or lower, including the possibility of capital loss, potential fund costs, etc.
3. Applied to your contributions plus state allowances (“Zulagen”) stacked over the saving years up to age 65

The projection assumes you:

1. Stay invested through to your 65th birthday (start of pension phase, “Auszahlungsphase”)
2. Contribute the amount you enter every year (no missed payments)
3. Are signed up to Flex - additional information on potential platform costs is not considered in the projection

The value projection is intended as an illustration and is not a reliable indicator of future performance. Actual results may vary based on market conditions, fees and other factors.

Trading 212 can give general product information, but not personal pension, tax or investment advice. In Flex, you choose from the eligible product universe yourself. Trading 212 may show product information, risk information and suitability or appropriateness checks where required, but it won’t present a personalised recommendation.

We plan to offer Flex and Standard with no account fees, and free ETF switching in Flex. Fund costs may apply.

Trading 212 will announce all product details when the certified product is ready and when the Product Information Sheet ("Produktinformationsblatt") becomes available.

You can usually leave old Riester capital with the old provider, but opening a new post-2026 AVD can move your retirement provision into the new funding system and can end legacy contract ("Bestandsvertrag") status for the old contract. Trading 212 will ask about existing Riester or AVD contracts and show the legal consequences before you sign.

The AVD is a long-term retirement product - by law, your money is locked until your 65th birthday (pension phase “Auszahlungsphase” begins) or by 70th birthday, if you choose to invest into the account for longer. Withdrawing earlier triggers what the law calls harmful use ("schädliche Verwendung"), which means:

1. All state allowances (“Zulagen”) you received must be repaid
2. All tax breaks you claimed on contributions must be repaid
3. Gains in the account become fully taxable

The AVD framework includes two important exceptions for using money early without penalty:

1. Your own home: withdrawing capital to buy or pay down the mortgage on a home you live in (Home-Riester / Home pension - “Eigenheimrente”)
2. Hardship cases: disability or death (see “What happens if I become disabled or die?”)

The withdrawal options available with Trading 212 will be confirmed at launch.

You can also stop contributing at any time without penalty - your money stays invested and tax-deferred until age 65 or 70, depending on your choice.

The following options are presented based on the BMF comments here. The payout options available with Trading 212 will be confirmed at launch.

The reformed AVD is a pure investment product - unlike old state-subsidised private pension product (“Riester”), it no longer bundles disability or life insurance into the contract. Instead:

• If you die: your AVD capital - including all allowances (“Zulagen”) earned to date - can be transferred tax-free to your spouse's or registered civil partner's own AVD or AVD-eligible contract. No clawback of state allowances will take place. Non-spouse heirs repay the allowances and tax relief. The tax-free spouse route only applies if the spouse is not separated and lives in the EU/EEA.
• If you become unable to work/ lose earning capacity (“Erwerbsminderung”): you can apply for early access to your AVD funds without losing your allowances, on proof of disability.

If you want broader disability or life cover, you'll need a separate insurance product - that part has been deliberately unbundled to make AVD cheaper and simpler.

The planned annual contribution limit is €6,840. The final contribution rules will be confirmed before you open an account.

This is separate from the amount needed to receive the maximum basic allowance. If you qualify for the full basic allowance, contributing €1,800 a year can give you the maximum of €540. The allowance is per eligible person (per account holder), not per account, so your maximum allowance is €540 on both accounts.

If you are eligible, the German state tops up your AVD savings every year. Your allowance depends on your personal situation, which we cannot assess, and how much you pay in. Three layers stack:

• Basic allowance (“Grundzulage”):
  • 50 cents for every €1 you save on the first €360 per year - up to €180
  • 25 cents for every €1 you save from €360.01 to €1,800 per year - up to an additional €360
  • Maximum: €540 a year in state allowances - active from day one in 2027 (no later step-up)
• Child allowance (“Kinderzulage”): up to €300 per child, per year (for one parent).
• Career starter bonus (“Berufseinsteiger-Bonus”): open an AVD before your 25th birthday and the state pays a one-time €200 bonus on top of your first Grundzulage.

Minimum to unlock any allowance: just €120 a year of your own contribution (€10 a month).

It depends on the type of unemployment - the law treats three situations differently:

1. You receive unemployment benefits I (“Arbeitslosengeld I”, “ALG I”). Good news: while you're on ALG I, you remain a compulsory member of the statutory pension scheme - so for AVD purposes you're treated exactly like an employee. Depending on your eligibility and contributions, you can get:
   1. Up to €540/year basic allowance (“Grundzulage”)
   2. Up to €300/year child allowance (“Kinderzulage”) per child
   3. Full tax deduction on contributions up to €1,800/year
   4. The €200 Career starter bonus (“Berufseinsteiger-Bonus”) if you're under 25
2. You receive Citizen's allowance (“Bürgergeld” - formerly ALG II / Hartz IV”), or are not working, but you are married to (or in a registered civil partnership with) an eligible person - you could qualify as Indirectly allowance-eligible (“mittelbar zulageberechtigt"). Your conditions for allowance eligibility are as follows:
   1. A basic allowance of up to €175/year (the cap is reached as soon as your spouse contributes €350+/year into their own AVD).
   2. A statutory minimum contribution of €120/year (€10/month) is mandatory. You must pay this out of pocket into your own contract to trigger any state allowance; it is not optional.
   3. Up to €300/year child allowance per child, based on your own contributions.
   4. No tax deduction (the Special-expenses deduction or “Sonderausgabenabzug” is only available to the directly eligible spouse).
3. You receive Bürgergeld (or are not working) AND you are single / not married to an eligible person - you belong to the non-eligible segment (“nicht zulageberechtigt”). This means:
   1. No state allowances: You do not receive the basic allowance or child allowances.
   2. No tax deductions: You cannot deduct your contributions from your income tax.
   3. What happens to your AVD: Your contract does not get cancelled. You can either pause your contributions without penalty or continue paying into the account out of pocket without receiving state allowances.
4. If you start working, receive ALG I, or marry an eligible person, your contract may become allowance-eligible, depending on your circumstances (no need to open a new contract).

The following options are presented based on the BMF comments here. The payout options available with Trading 212 will be confirmed at launch.

When you reach age 65 or 70 (depending on your choice, minimum is 65), you choose how to receive your AVD as retirement income. The law gives you two main options that you can also combine:

1. Up to 30% as a tax-deferred lump sum at the start of the payout phase ("Auszahlungsphase"). You receive this in cash and the tax due on it can be spread across the following five years.
2. Monthly pension payments from the remaining capital. You choose between:
   1. A lifetime annuity ("Leibrente"): guaranteed monthly payments for as long as you live, no matter how old you get.
   2. A long-term payout plan ("Auszahlungsplan"): monthly payments that must last at least until your 85th birthday, after which any remaining capital is paid out as a final lump sum.

Your capital that hasn't been paid out yet stays invested in your AVD during the payout phase - so it continues to grow tax-free.

Why age 65 and not earlier? Under the new 2026 reform, the earliest payout age for AVD is 65 (vs. 62 for old Riester contracts). The cut-off was raised to align with the rising statutory pension age in Germany. You can still choose to contribute until the age of 70 - the law provides you flexibility with your own retirement start.