Description: Read the August 2020 issue of The Modeling Platform published by the Modeling Section. Newsletters provide practical information for the working actuary, articles on trends that impact sections and news about section activities.

Description: This article contains best practices on actuarial modeling based on the author's personal experiences and provides useful advice for actuaries to consider in their daily work.

Description: With many complex regulatory changes on the horizon as well as pressures to ensure model accuracy from auditors, regulatory requirements and new actuarial standards of practice, the importance of robust model validation is coming to the forefront of actuaries’ minds. What was previously a day-two task for many companies is becoming just as important as model development! In this session, you will hear from those that have been deeply involved in building model validation frameworks and tools in responses to regulatory changes GAAP Long Duration Targeted Improvements (“LDTI”) and Principles Based Reserves (“PBR”).

Description: The cloud inspires awe and fear in equal parts these days. There is a need to learn more, but there’s much information to learn and it may be difficult to know what to learn next. In this session, we’ll carve off a small corner of the cloud and make it your own. Setting up a Data Science Virtual Machine on Digital Ocean will be demonstrated. It’s the fastest way to get a data science development environment setup for your own use. Many of the topics and ideas covered will apply to almost all other cloud offerings. What use cases Digital Ocean is good for, and what use cases you should look elsewhere for, will also be discussed.

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: Claims are insurers deepest and richest transactional data – yet we rarely unleash the full potential of this data. In this session, we will discuss potential sources and attributes of claims data, traditional approaches alongside new analytic techniques and how to integrate models into existing claims management processes. During this session, the presenters will discuss different areas of how machine learning can drive significant value unleashing the potential in claims data, these include data capture, claims management and workflow design as well as behaviour prediction. In addition, the audiences will also have opportunity to learn different use cases of how claims models taking advantage of machine learning, such as foreign death fraud detection and critical illness triage.

Description: Machine learning models are not black-boxes; these models can easily be interpreted using tools like SHAP, LIME and Anchor. These tools can facilitate the understanding of the model and the business problem. We can used these tools to build better models and communicate how predictions are generated. This article demonstrates their use in a mortality model.

Description: This article provides a brief overview of the current state of machine learning (ML) and artificial intelligence (AI) as they apply to actuarial science, including discussion around the integration of actuarial judgment with ML and AI. It concludes with an example of explainable ML through a python tool known as SHAP (SHapley Additive exPlanations), which is able to explain the key drivers behind individual ML or AI predictions.

Description: This article will be focused on maximizing the reuse of code using features available within Moody’s Axis specifically targeted at using Formula Link.

Description: Oliver Wyman recently completed its 2020 Life PBR Emerging Practices survey, with results providing a broad industry perspective on implementation impacts, strategy, assumptions and challenges. This article provides further insights into the trends and drivers observed around planned future refinements to PBR models.