Description: This paper explores how molecular biology, specifically epigenetics, may impact the life insurance industry, and considers the effects of utilizing epigenetic biomarkers for underwriting.

Description: This report explores conversion rates and post-conversion experience using predictive analytics.

Description: 1959 SOA Regional Meetings in Atlanta and San Francisco. These discussions on pensions examined the advantages of funding deferred profit sharing plans through a life insurance company and the problems involved in final average retirement plans.

Description: Over the past month, the evolution of the COVID-19 pandemic has raised questions on how this outbreak will impact life insurance industry claims. This report pulls emerging U.S. COVID-19 hospitalization data and deaths obtained from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) COVIDView, a Weekly Surveillance Summary of U.S. COVID-19 activity, and compares it to data from past U.S. influenza seasons obtained from the CDC’s Flu Activity and Surveillance webpage.

Description: This article investigates the properties of the Gompertz distribution function. Explicit formulas for continuous life insurances and annuities are given in terms of the left-truncated gamma function. Moreover, approximations for the mean, variance, skewness and kurtosis of the Gompertz distribution are also given. Finally, the article shows that using a Gompertz assumption at fractional ages produces better a approximation than the usual UDD assumption.

Description: This report explains the concept and construction of the Market Consistent Embedded Value (MCEV) measure, as well as its usefulness as a profit/risk measure relative to other profit/risk measures currently used by insurance companies for various products. The knowledge from this research will assist actuaries, corporate leadaers, risk management professionals and others in understanding, implementing and comparing MCEV to current risk assessment tools utilized by insurance companies.

Description: Initiated by the Financial Reporting Section, this paper explores rising interest rates. Following this path, the paper will look at implications of interest rate changes for the life insurance industry, current stress testing practices, and how a risk manager can proactively prepare for an uncertain future. A paper published in 2014 focused on why rates could stay low, and some aspects of this paper are similar (e.g., description of insurance products). This paper also uses a sample model office to help practitioners look at their own exposures. It includes typical interest-sensitive insurance products and how they might perform across various scenarios, as well as a survey to establish current practices for how insurers are testing interest rate risk currently.

Description: Using recently updated data from the United States Mortality Database (USMDB, usa.mortality.org), this report presents an overview of historical mortality trends in all 50 U.S. states and the District of Columbia for the period 1959-2018.

Description: This paper develops the theoretical formula for the face amount under the New York Life variable life insurance design, introduced in the paper 'Analysis of Basic Actuarial Theory for Fixed Premium Variable Benefit Life Insurance,' adapted to a daily basis and also provides a simplified approximation of this formula. A formula for daily net premium is also derived.

Description: This paper is intended to acquaint actuaries with a simple and practical application of the ruin function technique in the determination of the C-2 mortality risk reserve needed for individual life insurance business. Followed by 2 discussion papers submitted