Description: Presented at May 1996 Spring Meeting. The investment environment has undergone significant change over the last several years through the introduction of many sophisticated investment vehicles. This session provides an update on current challenges encountered by life insurance companies in accounting for this new array of investments. Among the issues covered will be accounting for derivatives, mortgage-backed securities, and other hedging vehicles. The session also includes some of the system and projection modeling challenges encountered as a by-product of investment in these vehicles.

Description: The series expansion of a probability density function, known to actuaries by Esscher's name and to statisticians as the saddlepoint approximation, typically gets integrated to approximate probability values under the density, with a location parameter in the expansion chosen to optimize convergence of the integrated series. We review the general form, the accuracy and the derivation of the Esscher approximation. Then we propose using related series expansions for the derivative of a probability density function to approximate the value of the point of maximum likelihood for the density. The key is to make the value of the location parameter an unknown and assume it to be the point of maximum likelihood, which leads to a tractable optimization problem to find its value.

Description: Usual treatments of multiple-decrement theory are on a nonselect basis, with all rates of decrement depending only on attained age. This paper develops the theory on a select basis, carried out fully in the stochastic framework. The relationship between select periods in a multiple-decrement model and those of the associated single-decrement models is investigated. A discussion of the paper follows. From Transactions of Society of Actuaries 1991, Vol. 43.

Description: Presented at May 1986 Spring Meeting. This session discussion is about regulatory aspects, administrative aspects, financial reporting issues and Canadian products.

Description: This paper first discusses the history of the legislation of the joint and survivor benefits for the uniformed service personnel. It then goes on to address the specific actuarial assumptions made and the formulas developed for applying these assumptions for adaptability to the UNIVAC. This paper closes with specific programming procedures involved in using the UNIVAC.

Description: From a session at a meeting of the Society of Actuaries held in San Diego, CA, June 22-23, 2000 The panel provides an update on the status of the Factors in the Risk Selection Techniques Study.

Description: Paper examining the degree to which certain actuarial methods satisfy public pension plan funding objectives.

Description: The paper discusses the optimal design of dividend - or premium refund - formulas that occur in connection with group insurance contracts. Sample formulas are provided and analyzed from a statistical analysis perspective . Followed by 2 discussion papers submitted

Description: Session from a 1992 meeting of the Society of Actuaries . Representatives of the IRS addressed current IRS regulation issues with respect to qualified pension plans, followed by a question and answer session with the audience.

Description: Introduction to the paper that documents the flaws of the current financial model.