Facts and Figures

There were over six million Child Trust Funds issued, with an average value of c. £1,900 - that’s about £11.6 billion in total. The Government contributed c. £3.3 billion in total to open the accounts, family contributions accounted for another c. 2.5 billion, and the remaining £5.8 billion came from growth in the value of investments over the years.

Parents were invited to open a Child Trust Fund for each child born in the UK between 1 September 2002 and 2 January 2011, as soon as possible after birth. 4.4 million children had accounts opened by their parents, of which 3.1 million were invested in the ‘kite-marked’ Stakeholder investment accounts (see ‘What is a CTF?’), 1 million as cash deposit accounts and just under 300,000 as non-Stakeholder investment accounts, many of which were self-select. A further 1.7 million accounts were opened by HM Revenue & Customs as ‘Revenue-Allocated’ Stakeholder investment accounts because their parents hadn’t taken action before their first birthday.

Numbers of CTFs (in ‘000s) opened by age group were as follows:

The oldest Child Trust Fund holders are therefore well into their 21st year: the youngest were 11 years old in January ‘22.

The geographical analysis of the scheme provides a good insight into regional differences, both in the account types opened and in the extent to which Government made additional contributions:

The table above is particularly helpful for CTF Ambassadors working in different regions of the United Kingdom and, as at end-December 2023, we have estimated a regional analysis of unclaimed adult-owned accounts based on the account providers’ trade association overall estimate of 42% and our estimate that 70% of HMRC-allocated remain unclaimed:

At the individual family level - estimates for those aged over 16

If your family is among the 15% most wealthy, your account will be worth about £4,000 in average value terms: starting from an average Government contribution of just £250. Only 6% of these accounts are ‘Addressee Gone Away’, so there’ll be a pretty good chance that you know where the account is.

If your family is among the 15% worse off, your account will be worth about £1,900 on average, starting from an average Government contribution of nearly £1,000. Because about 85% of these accounts are ‘Addressee Gone Away’ or were never registered, it’s quite likely you don’t know anything about it – yet.

And if your family is in the broad middle ground, the 70% which is middle England, your average account value will be just over £1,000, half of which was the Government contribution. There’s about four million young people in this category, and a one in four chance that you don’t know where the account is.