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 (the table below shows how this related to birth dates and the child’s circumstances), 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-October 2024, we have estimated a regional analysis of unclaimed adult-owned accounts based on the HMRC overall estimate in September ‘24 of 671,000 and a weighted average of account provider estimates of 46% for unclaimed HMRC-allocated accounts:

At the individual family level - estimates for those aged over 18

If your family is among the 15% most wealthy, your account will be worth about £5,000 in average value terms. Less than 5% 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 and you were one of the older recipients who received a second payment, your account will be worth about £2,900 on average, starting from an average Government contribution of £1,000 or more. Because most of these accounts are ‘Addressee Gone Away’ or were never registered, it’s quite likely you don’t know anything about it — the unclaimed rate is c. 42%.

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 for the older recipients. There’s about four million young people in this category, and a one in six chance that you don’t know where the account is.