Total U.S. retirement assets rose 6.3 percent to $18.9 trillionin the first quarter of 2012, up from $17.8 trillion on Dec. 31,2011, according to data compiled by the Investment CompanyInstitute.

The increase in retirement assets was driven in part by the risein corporate equity values. The S&P 500 Total Return Index grewby 12.6 percent in the first quarter, for example. Retirementsavings accounted for 36 percent of all household financial assetsin the United States at the end of the first quarter.

There was $5.2 trillion in individual retirement accounts at theend of the first quarter, an increase of 7.3 percent from the endof the fourth quarter of 2011. Forty-six percent of IRA assets, or$2.4 trillion, were invested in mutual funds.

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