Description: This paper is designed to be a single reference source for an actuary who wants to increase his or her understanding of a Guaranteed Investment Contract 'GIC', its risks, and how to control them. The paper emphasizes the practical difficulties of matching asset and liability cash flows and discusses in detail how the sponsor and/or participants of the plan being funded by the GIC can antiselect against the insurance company. It also discusses how the actuary should go about pricing and reserving for GICs. From Transactions of Society of Actuaries 1984, Vol. 36.

Description: This paper models minimum pension guarantee using a simulation approach. Lachance and Mitchell [2002] have shown that it could be important if and when individual accounts are introduced in the United States. This paper's model uses real data from Mexico where individual accounts are already a reality and the minimum pension guarantee is already enshrined by law. The authors calculate the probability of the government needing to honor the guarantee and estimate the cost of such a promise using a real options approach. Higher investment in the stock market turns out to be the key. The higher the proportion of investment allowed by law in stocks, the lower the probability of government support.

Description: As we meet with pension plan sponsors and consultants across Canada we find that the subject of liability-driven investing LDI comes up repeatedly even when we do not initiate the discussion. We also find that LDI seems to mean something different to each person we meet. Is LDI just a new name for asset/liability management ALM? Or is LDI just about hedging interest rate risks with fancy securities? In this article we describe a framework for understanding what LDI is, how it relates to ALM, and how it can be used to solve real-life problems for Canadian pension funds.

Description: Asia is experiencing changing demographic, social, and cultural tides which threaten to submerge existing retirement-pension systems.

Description: Discussant comments for “Requirements to Make the Housing Asset a Viable Retirement Asset.” This paper examines the characteristics of an ideal product and the type of institution that would be well positioned to offer the ideal product which would allow a housing asset to be a viable retirement asset. Discussant provides comments from a US perspective.

Description: 2015 accomplishments of the Investment Section of the Society of Actuaries.

Description: This document is a summary of a session which was presented at the 1975 SOA Annual meeting. It includes discussions on the following topics: Effects of ERISA on valuation methods, discussion of Claude Y. Paquin's paper A Review of Actuarial Cost Methods for Defined Benefit Pension Plans, funding standard account, asset valuation and allocations, plan mergers, a discussion of Josiah M. Lynch's paper A Practical Approach to Gains Analysis, information related to Individual policy pension trusts.

Description: Panelists discuss the need for pension fund managers to continually reexamine their allocation of funds across broad asset classes, and determine the most prudent mix of investments. From the Record of the Society of Actuaries, Vol. 24, No. 2.

Description: An increased focus on pension plan cost and risk management has led plan sponsors to pursue innovative plan designs. This, in turn, is driving the need for actuaries to utilize new approaches to modeling the underlying market risks of such plan designs. The presenters will discuss advanced techniques to pension plan cash flow modeling that will ensure that the risks embedded in complex plan design features are fully captured. Specifically, a new dimension to cash flow modeling, benefit commencement year (in addition to payment year), will be introduced as well as the concept of 'collapsible' cash flow. Case studies will illustrate how techniques can be used in practice for cash balance plans, pension equity plans and other lump sum paying plans. Other risks such as form of payment and longevity will also be covered. This session is intended to meet the needs of actuaries and investment consultants focused on providing advice on risk management and investment strategy to sponsors of pension plans with complex design features.

Description: This session dealt with pension fund investments with respect to the following discussion topics: A. In May, 1962, there was a drastic fall in stock prices. What effect, if any, did this have on a objectives as to the proportion of pension funds invested in equities and b methods of valuing equity pension assets for pension- fund valuation purposes? B. Where pension funds are invested in a pooled or commingled account what special problems are encountered in asset valuation for pension-fund valuation purposes as distinguished from investments held in an individual separate account or trust?