Description: In this paper, the authors value three embedded guarantees in cash balance plans using option pricing fair valuation principles. Two of the guarantees are valued using a closed form adaptation of the Black-Scholes formula. The third guarantee is valued via a Monte-Carlo stochastic simulation of the risk- neutral interest rates process using a Hull-White interest rate model.

Description: A research project with the Society of Actuaries on interest rate hedging on traditional life and health insurance.

Description: This report presents the results of six focus groups with retirees who have at least $100,000 of investable assets and must depend on that money to maintain their lifestyles because they do not have sufficient amounts of annuitized income from Social Security and defined benefit plans to meet all of their expenses. The purpose of the focus groups was to gain an understanding of how current retirees approach key financial decisions about managing their money in retirement. The benefits of this qualitative study are multidisciplinary. It can help: 1. actuaries design better retirement financial systems, 2. the financial services industry understand areas of misperception and causes of poor management, and 3. provide policy-makers an understanding of how to drive public policy goals.

Description: The purpose of this study is to evaluate the predictive accuracy of the commercially available claims-based risk assessment tools under different sets of conditions and with different sets of available information.

Description: This report explains the concept and construction of the Market Consistent Embedded Value (MCEV) measure, as well as its usefulness as a profit/risk measure relative to other profit/risk measures currently used by insurance companies for various products. The knowledge from this research will assist actuaries, corporate leadaers, risk management professionals and others in understanding, implementing and comparing MCEV to current risk assessment tools utilized by insurance companies.

Description: The Society of Actuaries Health Benefit Systems Practice Advancement Committee sponsored this review of recent academic literature on the US healthcare system covering quality, access, costs

Description: Healthcare costs have been rising faster than general inflation for many years. Early models that predicted this past pattern projected healthcare expenditure growth that continued to outpace total expenditure growth leading to the fallacious position that the whole of the US economy would ultimately be consumed by healthcare. This paper presents a long term healthcare trends resource model, prepared for the Society of Actuaries by Professor Thomas Getzen, that includes capacity constraints to ensure the long-term projection is rational. The motivation for creation of the model was driven by its potential usage as a resource for the estimation of reportable liabilities for retiree healthcare benefits as specified under FAS 106 and GASB 45 accounting statements.

Description: This research project examines operational risk management practices and assess the viability of ORM as a formal discipline. A key goal of this initiative has been to determine whether the management of operational risk is feasible, and, if so, what issues need to be addressed in order to effectively implement ORM within a broader ERM context.