Description: Overview of evolving industry trends and examples of how life insurers in Canada are innovating.

Description: This is the third and final installment of an article about using microeconomics and the concepts of embedded value to better manage and understand the profitability of direct marketing programs. The article illustrates how traditional asset share calculations are not appropriate in this case.

Description: Mandatory implementation of life principle-based reserves (PBR) is just around the corner and there is no shortage of work to do, as most products have yet to be moved to PBR. Oliver Wyman recently completed its 2019 PBR survey, with more than 40 participants covering 85 percent of the individual life market, including 23 of the top 25 life writers and five reinsurers. This article will expand on the key survey findings, including implementation trends, analysis to date and recent discussions and decisions on the treatment of non-guaranteed reinsurance.

Description: discussion of arbitrage possibilities cause by inconsistent mortality pricing assumptions in annuity products vis. a vis. life insurance products

Description: This paper outlines the limitations inherent in current actuarial pricing techniques and describes a product development process that can produce optimal decisions in competitive environments. From Product Development Section Monograph, M-AS99-3.

Description: The management of the investments of an insurance enterprise has undergone a considerable evolution since the pioneering work of Redington in the mid 20th century. Best practices have evolved to incorporate ever more complex insurance liabilities, expanding investment asset classes and global market opportunities. Strategic asset allocation (SAA), liability driven investing, and other robust optimization approaches form the core of the professional management of insurance company investments.

Description: Discusses how companies must ensure that significant and necessary product development, and administrative and compliance system changes, have been completed and tested in time to accommodate new requirements.

Description: Results of survey conducted in July 2006 about the methods used by insurers to develop their pricing mortality assumptions for fully underwritten life insurance in the U.S. The objective was to understand how companies adjust base mortality tables and whether mortality improvement was assumed.

Description: This article discusses challenges in innovation, governance, and balancing the tension that naturally arises between them. Company culture is often a driver of success or failure in innovation. This article outlines a new dynamic to address this challenge.

Description: Discussion of a direct writer survey and a reinsurer survey conducted in the fall of 2002 by the Society of Actuaries. The surveys asked a number of questions about underwriting criteria needed to qualify for preferred risk. They also asked questions about the percentage of issues in each underwriting category and the mortality assumptions for the different categories.