News

The importance of security of occupational pensions has been highlighted by the financial crisis, and there have been calls for the Solvency II framework to be applied directly to pension plans to provide greater security for plan members. Whilst this is one possibility, it would have significant ramifications; other approaches may be more suitable for pensions.

CEIOPS and the Groupe Consultatif have assembled a programme for a hands‐on practical workshop on QIS5 to be held at the CEIOPS office in Frankfurt on 25th and 26th August.  The outline programme has been designed such that the first day should suffice for general insurance actuaries while the second day will address specialised life (with‐profits) issues.  Participants may register for each day separately.

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The Society of Actuaries in Ireland has published a sample risk register to help pension scheme trustees and sponsoring employers, with the assistance of their actuarial advisers, to identify the various risks inherent in pension schemes and to manage these risks effectively. 

Scheme Actuaries, in particular, are encouraged to use the sample risk register to engage with their clients on the broad spectrum of risks, from financial to operational, that pension schemes face. 

The Society of Actuaries in Ireland has prepared sample Protocols to assist actuaries who are appointed to advise the trustees and/or sponsoring employer of a pension scheme and who need to prepare a Protocol on the management of conflicts of interests in accordance with ASP Pen-13, Conflicts of Interests – Pensions Actuaries.

The sample Protocols are available under Press & Publications / Briefing Statements. 

The Groupe Consultatif has submitted comments on the draft QIS 5 technical specification to the European Commission.

The paper identifies a number of high-level issues:

Over 2,000 years after Aristotle argued that the earth is not flat, similar discussions are taking place (sort of!) for actuarial valuations. In a webinar on 30th June, organised by the UK Actuarial Profession, Hewitt's John Coulthard and Roger Moring will discuss the merits of using term-dependent assumptions for valuations from a corporate and trustee perspective respectively and will share some practical lessons learned.

The CEA, CRO Forum and CFO Forum have written to the European Commission to comment on the application of the illiquidity premium to liabilities in both the implementing measures for Solvency II and the fifth quantitative impact study (QIS 5). Welcoming the EC’s more granular approach to the application of the illiquidity premium, the paper sets out proposals for criteria to be tested in QIS 5.

Last month, the Financial Regulator issued a questionnaire to insurance undertakings that had expressed a wish to enter into the Solvency II internal model pre-application readiness assessment process.   

This month, the Financial Regulator held a number of workshops to discuss the questionnaire.

The Financial Regulator has now published a document that sets out the questionnaire together with the main questions raised in the workshops and the Financial Regulator's responses to these questions.

The UK Actuarial Profession wishes to commission research in the area of modelling and understanding heterogeneity in mortality and morbidity risk which has an impact in areas of actuarial interest.

The Financial Regulator has published a consultation paper on "Corporate Governance Requirements for Credit Institutions and Insurance Undertakings".

The paper attempts to align corporate governance requirements with recent international regulatory initiatives in the governance field and proposes minimum standards that credit institutions and insurance undertakings will be expected to meet in this area.

In an address to a Financial Regulator Solvency II Insurance Forum this week, Jonathan McMahon, Assistant Director General, Financial Institutions Supervision, urged companies to allocate significant resources to the implementation of Pillar 2 (risk management and governance) and Pillar 3 (supervisor reporting and disclosure) of the Solvency II framework.  He commented that the implementation of Basel II (The Capital Requirements Directive) led banks and regulators to place too much importance on models and their outputs.  He stressed that, while high quality models are important,