Description: Increased attention was paid to regulatory capital with the global financial crisis in 2008. Whilst companies may not have the incentives to retain a large amount of capital in the absence of regulatory capital requirements, overcapitalized entities can have drawback such as its impact on competitiveness. There are other weaknesses in the regulatory capital model such as its limitation in facilitating risk-based decisions as regulatory capital does not necessarily reflect the economic reality and risks an entity faces. Nonetheless, there are ways for regulators and/or companies to handle the weaknesses in the regulatory capital model. For instance, granularity can be introduced in determining regulatory capital. Economic capital can be used to encourage entities to implement risk management controls and facilitate risk-based business decisions (e.g., risk-adjusted performance assessment and risk-based capital allocation). Ultimately, hav ing effective risk management and risk-based capital determination are ways to prevent company failures and bankruptcies.

Description: This article highlights 13 attributes shared by various groups of companies that landed in trouble. The companies are identified, and the attributes are described.

Description: This article serves as a Solvency II primer by first introducing the Solvency II framework and then identifying several implementation issues that are still being resolved.

Description: Risk based pricing addresses some of the shortcomings of traditional pricing methods by providing a framework for understanding the tradeoffs between shareholder risks and rewards using a robust, transparent and objective economic methodology that is consistent across products.

Description: This article talks about the role that models played in the subprime meltdown and the subsequent crisis in the financial markets in general. The models failed to provide information about the magnitude of potential 'black swans'. Extreme Value Theory [EVT] is described as a potential solution to this error.

Description: The editors introduce the articles in this issue of the newsletter.

Description: The 2024 Dangerous Risks survey shows respondents react to recent increases in "old favorite" risks as technology evolves and the environment moves away from the pandemic.

Description: This article demonstrates and explains the differences between the current Canadian and U.S. capital regimes on life insurance companies. The concept and framework of regulatory capital is first introduced and Canadian regulation capital requirements—minimum continuing capital and surplus requirements (MCCSR) and U.S. regulation capital-risk based capital (RBC)—is explained and compared.

Description: A critical step in valuing a company for the purpose of financial reporting is the computation of the market value of economic surplus (MVES). This article provides a novel approach to the valuation of MVES that is stable and reasonably immune to “market noise.” Current approaches to the calculation of economic surplus of an insurance company generally define such surplus as the market value of the assets (MVA) supporting the liabilities less the market value of liabilities (MVL). While MVA is observable in the market, MVL is typically computed directly, without regard to the underlying supporting assets. Subtracting MVL from any value of assets that changes with market movements results in an unstable surplus. Consequently, a surplus that is not fully reflective of market sentiment has been rejected by many. This same approach is further used in the calculation of market consistent embedded value (MCEV) when a balance sheet approach is used .

Description: Read the September 2019 issue of Risk Management, published by the Joint Risk Management Section. Newsletters provide practical information for the working actuary, articles on trends that impact sections and news about section activities.