Description: 2023 was a year of continued change for the annuity market as interest rates stayed high. The rapid growth of RILA products stalled as FIA and MYGA products saw a significant increase in market share, with bonus products being extremely popular. The impact of ASOP 2 and the higher rate environment are continuing to be realized in experience, in-force management, product design and more. Learn more about the retail annuity market with a focus on the impacts of the current interest rate environment. Session materials will draw on experience studies, sales results, product changes, and more, which will examine how higher interest rates have altered the annuity market. At the conclusion of this session, you will understand recent trends in the annuity market, including emerging experience, new product designs, regulatory changes, and the impact of high interest rates.

Description: Life and annuity markets around the world have seen increasingly complex investment-combined products, including universal life, fixed indexed annuities, variable annuities with a wide variety of guaranteed benefits and indexed variable annuities. Insurance companies are facing unprecedented exposure to financial risks in addition to traditional mortality and longevity risks. The risk assessment and modeling for such complex designs by conventional methods often focus heavily on their market competitiveness and profitability. However, there seems to be a lack of quantifiable and systematic approaches to assess investment risks associated with investment combined products. The objective of the proposed work is to develop a framework for quantifying and analyzing various forms of contractual designs and showcase different techniques to assess the trade-off between competitive contractual designs and their practical implications regarding the difficulty of risk management.

Description: As the size of the life reinsurance market in Bermuda has grown to over half a trillion dollars at the end of 2021, more and more actuaries are getting involved with this 21 square mile North Atlantic island in one way or the other. Come explore a fundamental understanding of the Bermuda solvency framework and an overview of its upcoming changes.

Description: Discuss a comparison of the U.S. general and insured population mortality experience and how COVID-19 and non-COVID-19 excess deaths impacted the populations differently. Discover the population mortality experience in the UK with a focus on the recent emergence of excess deaths for non-COVID causes. The long-term implications on the insured population will also be explored. Wrap up with a discussion of different conditions of long COVID, including organ impairments.

Description: Statutory and GAAP metrics are useful for regulators, investors, and other external parties who require a consistent basis for viewing snapshots of companies at a point in time, however, their uses are more limited for managers who are tasked with making strategic decisions. Many insurers are turning to internally developed metrics such as value of new business (VNB) for better profitability insights at the point of sale and to understand how new business profitability changes over time. By leveraging existing models and reporting processes, insurers can reduce the additional effort involved, applying VNB toward applications such as pricing, capital allocation, and risk management. Discuss key considerations for developing and using VNB. Begin with a brief overview of VNB, including how VNB addresses specific shortcomings of Stat and GAAP. Next, discuss applications of VNB for life and annuity business and conclude with some implementation case studies.

Description: Reinsurance transactions have become increasingly common in the annuity market as means to reduce risk, improve pricing, release capital, or exit a line of business. The market has become increasingly complex as it has grown. Insurance carriers and reinsurance providers now need to keep up with a growing range of reinsurance structures to manage their business efficiently. This session will detail the different types of annuity reinsurance transactions currently being executed in the market, the costs and benefits of different approaches, and recent trends in reinsurance structuring. At the conclusion of the session, you will understand the basics of how annuity reinsurance is being used in the market today as well as how to understand and evaluate potential reinsurance transactions.

Description: Under U.S. GAAP long-duration targeted improvements (LDTI), some non-VA annuity products contain features scoped in as 'market risk benefits' (MRBs), which are required to be measured at fair value. For U.S. insurers, the question becomes 'How does the emerging principle-based reserving framework for non-variable annuities compare to the fair value framework for MRBs under LDTI?' See a comparison between these two new measurement models, highlighting some of the key considerations due to the added complexity of these calculations, to help companies strategically plan for their future state.

Description: Discover an overview of key trends in the pricing of RILAs, including key pricing assumptions and methodologies. Topics will include pricing targets/measures, surrender assumptions, pricing scenarios, use of ALM models and other key aspects, key product considerations given regulatory and distribution impacts.

Description: The life insurance industry has been dealing with low interest rate environment for many years. As a result, investment incomes have been low but many have found ways to embrace and deal with it. Recently, the interest rates have started to increase and at times are moving rather rapidly. While a rise in interest rates is perceived as a good thing, a rapidly rising interest rate environment can be problematic. Additionally, is 'lower for longer' no longer the norm? Learn more about the recent trend of rising interest rates and what can actuaries do about it in consideration to pricing and risk management.

Description: The Society of Actuaries will be offering this webinar series intended to educate and investigate aspects of life insurance, annuity, and long-term care product tax compliance. Developed by the Taxation Section, participants will be brought up to date on recent Internal Revenue Service (IRS) guidance and learn about the newest tax issues related to product design and administration. Legal, IRS and product development experts will provide vital insights into the challenges of developing and administering products within the requirements of the Internal Revenue Code (IRC) and allow ample opportunities for questions and information exchange. The session will look to define the “Product Tax Compliance" and "Information Reporting" Operational Risks associated with the administration of life insurance, annuity, and long-term care products. Panelists from leading insurance companies will discuss practical, real-life situations that they encountered and strategies they have used for risk mitigation.