Description: Asset cash flow modeling and asset assumptions are growing in importance with PBR especially considering the low interest rate environment. The Academy’s Life Practice Council and Life Valuation Committee have formed a Low Interest Rate Asset Adequacy Testing Task Force which has conducted an industry survey to raise awareness and summarize the actuarial best practices for financial reporting actuaries practicing in today’s very low interest rate environment. As the scrutiny on the asset side ratchets up, actuaries must consider how best to develop the asset assumptions as well as model the reinvestment and disinvestment strategies. Coherent assumptions and modeling practices across modeling exercises are expected while respecting the purpose of each calculation.

Description: From a session at the annual meeting of the Society of Actuaries held in Chicago, Illinois, October 15-18, 2000 Discussion of purposes and approaches for creating interest-rate scenarios.

Description: We consider Libor market model and calibration process. We estimate some interest rate derivatives such as Caps and Swaptions. We use Monte Carlo methods with appropriate dynamics under spot measure and forward measure. Imposing martingale discretization property, the same quantities are estimated again to see a contrast or discrepancy in light of confidence interval. Based on algorithms discussed in the paper, “Arbitrage-free discretizations of lognormal forward Libor and swap rate models” by Glasserman, P and Zhao, X 2000, the algorithms are implemented in excel VBA. Starting with current market data such as FRAs and Bond Prices, we describe steps involved to estimate the price of interest rate derivatives such as Caps and Swaptions, which would be beneficial to the practitioners in the industry.

Description: 1996 Valuation Actuary Symposium. This session about asset modeling discussed securities with options and derivatives, corporate government debt, mortgage-backed securities, collateralized mortgage obligations, real estate equities, and investment and disinvestment strategies.

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: Presented at June 1996 Spring Meeting. Provides overview of modern pricing of assets such as derivatives. It includes theory and practical applications, particularly how they relate to insurance companies.

Description: 1993 SOA Annual Meeting, New York. Insurance regulators commissioned a task force to develop cash-flow variability measurement standards. This session presented the recommendations of that task force and the relationship to cash-flow testing. Topics included: 1. The regulatory need and how the process was approached. 2. The types of CMO variability that the standards attempt to address. 3. A description of the scenario selection process that's used in this model. 4. The prepayment assumptions and the method to be used to collect prepayment data. 5. The relationship to cash-flow testing. 6. The regulators' reactions.

Description: 1998 SOA Spring Meeting, Maui. The panelists discussed the many factors involved with insurance company decisions on whether they are putting their money to work in a most prudent fashion. This session focused on the practical aspects of asset allocation.

Description: 1996 Valuation Actuary Symposium. This session discusses the purposes of building an asset model, the resource requirements, model validation, model granularity, understanding spreads, and model interest rates.

Description: This presentation outlines strategies for optimal return on bonds and presents the advantages of liability driven investing. From the Actuarial Research Clearing House ARCH 1990 Vol. 1.