Description: 2011 SOA Enterprise Risk Management Symposium, Chicago. This is the abstract of the referenced paper.

Description: Analyzes the need for enterprise risk management for small businesses and the unique principles governing such a discipline. The paper describes a case study done by Goldenson Actuarial Research Center at the University of Connecticut and concludes with some suggestions on how ERM for small businesses can be done on a larger and sustainable scale using student resources supported by large corporations, banks and government organizations.

Description: Improving understanding of the complex relationships among financial entities is critically important for risk managers and for financial authorities charged with multiple policy objectives. High quality information is lacking at both the intra- and inter-enterprise levels and to support analysis of the financial network. Put simply, the current quality and quantity of relationship data is not sufficient to deliver on the ultimate objectives. For the purpose of this discussion we use a very generic definition of a term relationship somewhat similar to the definition used to describe human relationships. And like in the human relationships case we will not claim that only marriage and blood connection makes your relatives, but also loaning a book, loving, hating and sharing a flat. In the financial context, the relationships may be determined by accounting rules set, for example, by IFRS or US GAAP, as well as regulatory requirements in areas o f risk management, market integrity, know-your-client, network analysis and statistical consolidation. The financial industry and regulators have spent countless hours arguing and debating the definition of ownership. The problem lies in the question itself. We suggest that as part of any relationship data system the best approach is to put the question aside and avoid a conceptual and practical quagmire. Rather, we recommend collecting and storing less-subjective granular data on theactual legal and economic relationships between firms, which provides a flexibleframework from which any user can answer the question on corporate relationships he or she determines is appropriate at a given time. Encouragingly, technological solutions are available to accommodate this multiplicity of requirements in a single solution. The paper outlines where the practical challenges are that inhibit the development of high quality relationship data and how they can be overcome.

Description: The article provides an introduction to the Stock Value Approach to enterprise risk management (ERM). A clear path toward implementation of comprehensive and pragmatic ERM is shown. The framework is underpinned by a company's goals as they relate to growth of the value of the company stock price.

Description: This paper develops a conceptually rigorous, but practical, approach to estimating risk margins that are consistent with actuary's cost of capital concept.

Description: The present crisis in global financial markets has created an impression that enterprise risk management ERM has failed broadly to protect the safety and soundness of the financial system as well as that of many institutions, including insurance companies.

Description: Crises are devastating. They leave behind a high amount of entropy unemployment, poverty, lack of safety. But this is half the truth. The other half says that crises are to some extend good, because they provide a natural crash test to discover current practices’ risks and limitations, and in response, give rise to more efficient regulation, to financial innovations and to the wakening of the vitalizing powers of society, as the old and corrupted die and new ideas emerge and give us the opportunity to reflect upon the future we want to have.

Description: Arguably, many of the fundamental contributing factors to the 2008 mortgage crisis involved misdirected incentives and misinformation available to key participants in the housing finance process. The incentives discussed here include those of the mortgage holders, mortgage intermediaries, mortgage providers, securitizers, raters and CEOs and other highly paid staff of those involved. Unless similar incentives are recognized, future public policy decisions will again fail to avoid this system-wide risk. Since I am most familiar with the U.S. situation, my comments will be limited accordingly.

Description: The liquidity crisis and the insufficient depth of the market led to a strong correlation crisis: many risks that could be considered as close to mutually independent in the classical regime suddenly became strongly positively dependent. More correlation crisis may happen in the future. We need to be more careful with black-box tools and to train what I would define as “quanlitative analysts” “Quanls” in the Enterprise Risk Management ERM process, that is risk managers who are able to lead interdisciplinary ERM studies from a jointly qualitative and quantitative point of view, with an emphasis on dynamics.

Description: Models are imperfect approximations of reality. Once a bubble has been recognized, that’s the time for mechanisms of caution and prudence to kick in, even in the face of exuberance – especially in the face of exuberance. Liquidity and trust is plentiful until it’s not – it can evaporate with blazing speed and only returns slowly. Risk is contagious, which means every single employee and citizen has a vested interest in taking on the role of chief risk officer.