The average tax refund this year is down 32.4% compared to last year, according to early filing data from the IRS. 

Tax season opened on Jan. 27, and the average refund amount was $2,169 as of Feb. 14, down from $3,207 about one year prior, the IRS reported on Friday. That figure reflects current-year refunds only.

However, the Feb. 14 filing data doesn’t include refunds receiving the earned income tax credit or additional child tax credit, which aren’t issued before mid-February, the IRS noted. The previous year’s filing data included tax returns claiming these credits. The value of these tax breaks can be substantial, even resulting in five-figure refunds, in some cases.

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Typically, you can expect a refund when you overpay taxes throughout the year via paycheck withholdings or quarterly estimated payments. By comparison, there’s generally a tax bill when you haven’t paid enough.

As of Dec. 27, 2024, the average tax refund for the 2024 season was $3,138, compared to $3,167 in late December 2023. 

The latest filing statistics come amid mass layoffs for the agency as Elon Musk’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, continues to cull the federal workforce. 

It’s unclear exactly how the staffing reduction could impact future taxpayer service. But experts recommend double-checking returns for accuracy to avoid extra touch points with the agency.

“Don’t call the IRS looking for your refund,” said Tom O’Saben, an enrolled agent and director of tax content and government relations at the National Association of Tax Professionals. 

You can check the status of your refund via the agency’s “Where’s My Refund?” tool or the IRS2Go app, which is “available 24 hours a day,” O’Saben said.

Typically, the agency issues refunds within 21 days of a return’s receipt. But some returns require “additional review,” which can extend the timeline, according to the IRS.

Gold prices are popping. But investors should avoid the temptation to chase a shiny object, investment experts said.

The SPDR Gold Shares fund (GLD), which tracks the price of gold bullion, is up about 11% in 2025 as of 2 p.m. ET Tuesday. Returns are up about 42% over the past year. (Prices were down more than 1% on Tuesday.)

Gold futures prices are also up about 10% year-to-date and currently 36% higher compared to the price a year ago. 

By comparison, the S&P 500 U.S. stock index is up about 1.5% in 2025 and 17% in the past year.

Lee Baker, a certified financial planner, said he wasn’t getting client calls about gold a year ago. Now, he fields them regularly.

He thinks investors would be wise to remember the classic rule from Warren Buffett, “Be fearful when others are greedy, and be greedy when others are fearful.”

“It feels to me everyone is starting to get greedy as it pertains to gold,” said Baker, owner and president of Claris Financial Advisors, based in Atlanta, and a member of CNBC’s Advisor Council.

The typical investor shouldn’t have an allocation to gold that exceeds 3% of a diversified portfolio, Baker said.

Investors enticed by lofty returns may make a knee-jerk reaction and buy a big chunk of gold (literally or figuratively) — and, in the process, make the common investment mistake of buying high and selling low, he said.

“If you’re going to make money with gold you need to buy and sell it — and hopefully sell it at right time,” Baker said. “And if you’re getting in now, are you buying at a peak? I don’t know.”

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Additionally, many investors buy gold because they think it’s a good inflation hedge, Samana said. (The data doesn’t always support that investment thesis.) Investors have been concerned by recent data that suggests progress on bringing down inflation may have stalled, he said.

U.S. sanctions on Russia dating to 2022 have been the “turbocharger” for gold returns over the past year or more, Samana said.

The sanctions led some central banks — in China, most notably — to buy more gold instead of U.S. Treasury bonds to avoid the potential difficulty of accessing assets denominated in U.S. dollars during a future geopolitical conflict, Samana said.

That has driven up gold demand higher compared to the price a year ago — and prices with it, he said.

“Don’t chase” gold returns, Samana said: “As a whole, you probably want to hold off on precious metals at [current] levels.”

Experts don’t expect gold to continue to shine.

“There’s no reason in my mind gold will continue to have a significant uptrend, barring — and I certainly hope not — some sort of protracted war,” Baker said.

Funds and stocks are generally more liquid in the event an investor needs to sell the asset, Baker said. Investors with a lot of physical gold likely have the additional hassle of storing it somewhere and insuring it, Baker said. Insurance may cost investors 1% to 2% or more of their gold’s value per year.

Similar to Baker, Samana believes it may be okay for investors to hold 1% to 2% of a well-diversified portfolio in gold.

Investors interested in buying gold should consider it as a piece of a broader commodities portfolio, which likely includes allocations to energy, agriculture and base metals like copper alongside precious metals like gold, Samana said.

Wells Fargo’s investment models have an overall commodities allocation that ranges from 2% for conservative investors to 7% for more aggressive growth, he said.

If the Trump administration is successful in dismantling key parts of the Education Department, the Treasury Department would be the next most logical agency to administer student debt, said Betsy Mayotte, president of The Institute of Student Loan Advisors, a nonprofit.

It’s also possible that the Justice Department or the Department of Labor could carry out some of the Education Department’s functions, according to a December blog post by The National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators.

But the transfer of tens of millions of borrowers’ account information between agencies would likely lead to errors, experts said. As a result, borrowers should gather the latest information on their student loan balance now, and keep an updated record of it, Yu said.

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At Studentaid.gov, borrowers should be able to access data on their student loan balance and payment progress, Yu said. If you don’t know which company services your student debt, you can find that information on that site, as well.

Borrowers should also request a complete payment history of their student loans if their debt has been transferred between companies in the past, Yu said. All this documentation will come in handy if your loan balance or payment history is reported inaccurately in the future.

Those who are pursuing Public Service Loan Forgiveness should certify their work history with the Education Department now, Yu said, “to ensure all eligible periods of employment count toward PSLF.”(PSLF offers debt erasure for certain public servants after 10 years of payments, and borrowers have already long complained of inaccurate payment counts.)

Consumer and privacy advocates are also concerned by recent reports that Musk’s DOGE had entered the Department of Education and gained access to federal student loan data on tens of millions of borrowers.

In a Feb. 6 letter signed by 16 Democratic senators, including Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Chuck Schumer of New York, the lawmakers said that the Education Department’s student loan database “contains millions of borrowers’ highly sensitive information, including Social Security numbers, marital status, and income data.”

That data “could be used to target financially vulnerable people for Musk’s upcoming financial services company, could be easily breached, or abused in any number of ways,” said Ben Winters, the director of artificial intelligence and privacy at the Consumer Federation of America.

A federal judge in Maryland on Monday granted a temporary restraining order barring DOGE staffers from accessing individuals’ sensitive data at the Education Department until March 10 while a lawsuit unfolds.

Unfortunately, “it’s nearly impossible to track a specific source of data, including how it’s leaked or used or sold,” Winters said. With that being said, people can check if certain information was included in a data breach on websites like, haveibeenpwned.com, he said.

Some services manage your online presence to try to limit where your data ends up, such as one offered by Discover, Winters said. Monitoring your credit score each month to ensure no unauthorized accounts have been opened in your name can also be useful, he added.

“Also carefully scan your card and account statements periodically,” Winters said.

If you’re worried about how your personal data with the Education Department may have been used, you can make a complaint with the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau at consumerfinance.gov/complaint. You may also report it to your state’s attorney general.