Description: This presentation, session number 43PD at the 2004 Spring Meeting of the Society of Actuaries, held June 14-15 in San Antonio, TX, discusses the use of mortgage-backed securities by life insurance companies. “Insurance companies in the United States have, for many years, invested in mortgage-backed securities MBS. The suitability of MBS for insurance company portfolios has been called into question by recent changes in interest rate volatility and increased capital requirements.” Discussion from participants is included. From the Record of the Society of Actuaries, Volume 30, No. 2.

Description: The purpose of the article is to highlight how a person or organization can excel in both a highly-competitive expert-driven environment and one where the environment is less so. One should focus on what can be done well and delegate the remaining tasks to those who are better at performing them. One should understand the environment they are operating in, how it impacts them, and how it may change through time. The principles have application to investment management, investment performance, organizational performance, business development, career progression and economics.

Description: The article compares the return characteristics, return, volatility, and correlation, to that of other possible selections as a DC safe option. It concludes that stable value is pareto superior to all other safe option candidates, and is therefore the optimal safe option.

Description: The effects of climate change have been widely documented. Whether it’s rising temperatures, more frequent and violent storms or disruption to wild life, there is a consensus in the scientific community that these effects are real. What are the risks and opportunities that climate change brings to an investment portfolio? As society transitions to more sustainable sources of energy and tries to find more sustainable ways to consume, there will be winners and losers. In this presentation, speakers will discuss their process to identify winners in this changing world and highlight the risks to various industries.

Description: Adaptive Risk Management harnesses social intelligence to identify emerging risks. We have entered an age of disruption where exponential technologies are transforming every industry. The ability to pivot in a rapidly evolving ecosystem is essential. Centralized “predict and control” paradigms will increasingly fail as complex interactions drive phase transitions. Successful organizations will harness social intelligence to “sense and respond” to giant waves of change. Maps amplify intelligence to help us navigate challenging terrain. Maps play a central role in all command centres, enabling rapid risk identification with a shared visual language. Interactive financial network maps allow analysts to explore and diagnose systemic fragilities, and mitigate critical vulnerabilities. Dynamic financial maps can also build visual intuition to detect escalating risk patterns. After observing early warning signals, analysts can apply network analytics to estimate likely second order effects. This allows organizations to proactively manage emerging risk before tipping points are crossed.

Description: Investment Fallacies: The Best Model Doesn't Win

Description: Discussion of interest rates and investments. The forum looked at the outlook for interest rates on life insurance funds, new developments for the investment of life insurance funds, common stock investments, inflation, and the nature and extent of the valuation problem created by direct investment private placement.

Description: Social Security provides financial protection by annuitizing retirement. This is not enough for many. My idea creates an additional annuity via Social Security.

Description: The purpose of the article is to summarize the results and conclusions of the C-1 Risk Task Force Report prepared for the Committee on Valuation and Related Areas. A key question: Is the risk to insurance companies of defaults on junk bonds sufficient to justify increasing required surplus levels?

Description: Investment Fallacies: Mathematical modeling of social phenomena