On the heels of President Donald J. Trump’s executive order in August 2025 (Executive Order), the private funds industry has eagerly awaited guidance from the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) to further promote the retailization of the private markets. That arrived in the form of the DOL’s proposed regulations (Proposal), which established a process-based safe harbor that plan fiduciaries could reference to satisfy their duty of prudence under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA) when including alternative assets in employer-sponsored 401(k) plans and other participant-directed defined contribution plans. Although the safe harbor offers a helpful path for plan fiduciaries to follow, a number of ambiguities remain that the industry will want to address before the comment period ends on June 1, 2026. Among the concerns raised by legal experts interviewed by the Private Equity Law Report, the Proposal inadequately accounts for the difficulties some plan participants may have in understanding the fee structures of alternative assets – and their distinct differences to traditional plan assets – to satisfy the ERISA duty of prudence. This second article in a two-part series analyzes the process-based, six-factor safe harbor in the Proposal that supplements the duty of prudence under ERISA, including some practical limitations faced by plan fiduciaries and private fund managers. The first article summarized how the Proposal clarifies the ERISA duty of prudence’s application to alternative assets, considered the Proposal’s relationship with the Executive Order and offered analysis from legal experts about its practical impact on the industry. See “SEC Investor Advisory Committee’s Recommendations to Facilitate Retail Access to Private Markets” (Oct. 30, 2025).