Description: From a session at a meeting of the Society of Actuaries held in San Diego, CA, June 22-23, 2000 The panel discussion covered: · The basic concepts underlying fuzzy logic · Current applications to risk classification and pricing · Possible future uses of fuzzy logic · The basic concepts underlying neural networks · Current applications of neural networks in life insurance · Possible future uses of neural networks

Description: By necessity, attributions of financial processes require approximations. Tools used for approximations include Aumann-Shapley, time step, step-through, average step-through, partial derivative, and average partial derivative. Significantly non-linear paths can cause problems during attribution. Time (theta) and market factors must be handled concurrently. Typically contractual factors can be handled separately. Average Step-Through, Aumann-Shapley and Aumann-Shapley-3 points perform the best given the same time period. Attribution should be done with fairly small time steps as opposed to using a lot of points in the Aumann-Shapley calculation, but using Aumann-Shapley-3 points as a last step has some advantages.

Description: This paper examines several methods for dynamically adjusting expense assets to reflect differences between actual and expected persistency. Discussions of the paper are included.