Description: Informal commentary on the importance to the actuarial community of embracing enterprise risk management and ORSA. Part of the essay collection "Risk Metrics for Decision Making and ORSA"

Description: Wavelet models are used to analyze risk by time and frequency and provide richer information than time series models.

Description: An analysis of the 1999-2011 experience of all Blues plans of betweeen $1.8 and $3.8 billion in annual revenue in 2010 to determine if there is any empirical evidence of an industry underwriting cycle. The analysis shows there is no such evidence.

Description: This paper employs the theory of real option pricing to address problems in the area of operational risk management. Particularly, it develops a two-stage model to help firms determine the optimal triggers in the event of an influenza pandemic. The first stage proposes a regime-dependent epidemic model to simulate the spread of the virus, depending on whether the firm is active or inactive. The second stage views the reactivation decision as a call option and the suspension decision as a put option, and uses dynamic programming method to determine the optimal switching thresholds.

Description: This is the abstract of a paper that considers the pricing of equity-indexed annuities using risk measures and presents dynamic hedging strategies underlying these valuations. Since these products involve mortality as well as financial risks, the authors combine the actuarial and financial approaches to protect insurance companies against the unhedgeable mortality risk.

Description: This abstract describes a paper that deals with linear pricing rules and risk measures and introduces two kinds of compatibility between prices and risks.

Description: A review of a webcast on Sarbanes-Oxley including a brief update on Sarbanes requirements, including some practical aspects of the Sarbanes “life cycle,” including living with Sarbanes beyond implementation.

Description: Feature article discussing quantitative impact studies, QIS5, on Solvency II.

Description: This is intended to serve as a fundamental resource for a basic understanding of ERM, as well as a guide to further study of the subject. Members of the Casualty Actuarial Society have participated in the effort, as well.

Description: Much of enterprise risk management has its roots in portfolio management and corporate finance. The concepts of trading off risk and return and benefits of diversification are well understood and articulated in both the actuarial and economics fields, so I don’t believe there are significant knowledge gaps preventing actuaries from contributing to the field. In fact, actuaries may have an advantage in many situations where a large part of a firm’s overall risk arises from pension activities or other more typical actuarial risks.