Description: Interest rates steadily declining ever since the Volcker Fed tackled inflation in the early eighties. Ten years of stimulating monetary policy brought new lows. We should have braced ourselves for a return to neutrality, but that concept remains elusive. We will explore structural issues that have brought rates to these low levels and the potential impacts on the insurance business.

Description: Institutional investors such as pension plans and insurance companies have enjoyed strong equity returns for a length of time with few historical precedents. Nearly a decade after the end of the financial crisis, strategies to provide downside protection remain expensive and the performance of traditional risk-managed funds has disappointed investors.

Description: This session 13TS of the Dallas Spring Meeting provides a basic background on derivatives and discusses how derivatives can be used in insurance and pension investment portfolios, how they are valued, and how they can impact the long-term financial situation of a portfolio.From the Record of the Society of Actuaries, Volume 27, No. 1, Session 13TS