Description: This article summarizes VM-31 updates to the 2018 and 2019 Valuation Manuals, and considerations for PBR Reports based on findings from the 2017 submissions.

Description: An overall analysis and attribution analysis of the impacts of the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act for certain life insurance contracts.

Description: An Overview of Stochastic Simulation modeling techniques and usages

Description: Discusses the newly adopted actuarial guideline for variable annuity reserving which is principles-based. It requires the calculation of both, a standard deterministic scenario reserve and a stochastic reserve - of which the larger of the two is used. This article discusses why for some companies the deterministic reserves dominate and for others the stochastic one does.

Description: In the United States, there has been much industry discussion of the challenges associated with a sustained low interest rate environment, which impacts both the asset and liability sides of the balance sheet in unfavorable ways. The intent of this article is not to focus on these strategic issues. Rather, we attempt to shine a spotlight on some of the modeling challenges that practicing actuaries may experience when incorporating negative interest rates into their models.

Description: GAAP's elimination of gross profit as a basis for amortization of deferred acquisition costs enables the accounting for reinsurance of universal life contracts to better reflect the economic protection provided by reinsurance. This article takes a fresh look at the standards of accounting for universal life contracts and for reinsurance, then puts them together to find the techniques that best account for that protection.

Description: A summary of the progress and recommendations of the Mortality Study Working Group and a request support in implementing the recommendations.

Description: This article provides illustrations of an approach to presentation of income and expenses that may be applied to long duration contracts, i.e., those that are measured by the building blocks approach for the emerging new standard on insurance contracts.

Description: GAAP's elimination of gross profit as a basis for amortization of deferred acquisition costs enables the accounting for reinsurance of universal life contracts to better reflect the economic protection provided by reinsurance. It also makes it easier to assess the effectiveness of different techniques. Building on the analysis of an earlier article, "A Fresh Look at Accounting for Reinsurance of Universal Life," this article presents a practical approach to estimating the ineffectiveness of several existing techniques at accounting for the economic protection provided by reinsurance. The article ends with a summary of what a company might do to improve the effectiveness of its reinsurance accounting.

Description: As an addendum to a July 2022 article, this article restates the formulas then presented for a framework to measure the reinsured portion of a direct loss from capping a net premium ratio or flooring a liability. The article corrects a flaw in one of the original formulas and shows, by example, how the framework can be applied to a specific application of reinsurance accounting.