Description: Note from Editor introducing the articles in this issue.

Description: Many ERM programs fail to include an active step of actual risk treatment and are therefore rightfully characterized as Entertainment Systems. Real ERM will use risk assessment to drive decisions about risk acceptance and risk mitigation. Entertainment systems use risk assessment to create reports and to hold discussions. No actions are taken often because ERM is not empowered to do anything.

Description: This Chairperson's Corner article discusses the SOA becoming the pre-eminent risk management profession. The Chairman's message is that actuaries have the inside track on risk management positions in the insurance industry and have a basis for competing for similar positions in the broader financial services industry.

Description: In this article the author discusses how ERM must be effectively applied to have the desired result. Stated another way, the banks that followed the basic precepts of ERM fared better in the crisis than those that didn't.

Description: The management of The Guardian Life Insurance Company of America Guardian decided during 2006 to perform an economic capital EC analysis, with results to be delivered in the spring of 2007. A second generation EC analysis EC 2.0 was conducted from fall 2007 through spring 2008. This article describes EC 2.0.

Description: This article provides some insights into how actuaries can quantify DC plan risks.

Description: Current risk management approaches for variable annuity business are not working very well in today's market turmoil.

Description: In this article, the author examines five common perspectives on risk and see how they affect not just each participant’s own choices but everyone else’s choices, as well.

Description: The Joint Risk Management Section conducted its fourth survey of emerging risks in fall 2010 in light of the BP oil spill which brought the impact of various risk combinations to the fore.

Description: The problem facing risk distributors is that product pricing is sticky, whereas the market price of risk can be quite volatile. This disconnection can become particularly severe during market downturns. The problem facing risk insurers is maintaining market share in benign market conditions when the market price of risk is low. Strategies that are dynamic with respect to time are difficult in practice, since they require more capital in volatile markets.