Claims reserving is central to the insurance industry. Insurance liabilities depend on a number of different risk factors which need to be predicted accurately. This prediction of risk factors and outstanding loss liabilities is the core for pricing insurance products, determining the profitability of an insurance company and for considering the financial strength (solvency) of the company. Following several high-profile company insolvencies, regulatory requirements have moved towards a risk-adjusted basis which has lead to the Solvency II developments. The key focus in the new regime is that financial companies need to analyze adverse developments in their portfolios. Reserving actuaries now have to not only estimate reserves for the outstanding loss liabilities but also to quantify possible shortfalls in these reserves that may lead to potential losses. Such an analysis requires stochastic modeling of loss liability cash flows and it can only be done within a stochastic framework. Therefore stochastic loss liability modeling and quantifying prediction uncertainties has become standard under the new legal framework for the financial industry. This book covers all the mathematical theory and practical guidance needed in order to adhere to these stochastic techniques. Starting with the basic mathematical methods, working right through to the latest developments relevant for practical applications; readers will find out how to estimate total claims reserves while at the same time predicting errors and uncertainty are quantified. Accompanying datasets demonstrate all the techniques, which are easily implemented in a spreadsheet. A practical and essential guide, this book is a must-read in the light of the new solvency requirements for the whole insurance industry.
This book first provides a review of various aspects of Bayesian statistics. It then investigates three types of claims reserving models in the Bayesian framework: chain ladder models, basis expansion models involving a tail factor, and multivariate copula models. For the Bayesian inferential methods, this book largely relies on Stan, a specialized software environment which applies Hamiltonian Monte Carlo method and variational Bayes.
This text introduces the commonly used, basic approaches for reserving and ratemaking in General Insurance. The methods are described through detailed examples that are linked from one chapter to another to illustrate their practical application. Also, professionalism requirements and standards of practice are presented to set the context for the methods and examples.
"This manual presents solutions to all exercises from Actuarial Mathematics for Life Contingent Risks (AMLCR) by David C.M. Dickson, Mary R. Hardy, Howard Waters; Cambridge University Press, 2009. ISBN 9780521118255"--Pref.
To meet future liabilities general insurance companies will set-up reserves. Predicting future cash-flows is essential in this process. Actuarial loss reserving methods will help them to do this in a sound way. The last decennium a vast literature about stochastic loss reserving for the general insurance business has been developed. Apart from few exceptions, all of these papers are based on data aggregated in run-off triangles. However, such an aggregate data set is a summary of an underlying, much more detailed data base that is available to the insurance company. We refer to this data set at individual claim level as "micro-level data." We investigate whether the use of such micro-level claim data can improve the reserving process. A realistic micro-level data set on liability claims (material and injury) from a European insurance company is modeled. Stochastic processes are specified for the various aspects involved in the development of a claim: the time of occurrence, the delay between occurrence and the time of reporting to the company, the occurrence of payments and their size and the final settlement of the claim. These processes are calibrated to the historical individual data of the portfolio and used for the projection of future claims. Through an out-of-sample prediction exercise we show that the micro-level approach provides the actuary with detailed and valuable reserve calculations. A comparison with results from traditional actuarial reserving techniques is included. For our case-study reserve calculations based on the micro-level model are to be preferred; compared to traditional methods, they reflect real outcomes in a more realistic way.
In this monograph, authors Greg Taylor and Gráinne McGuire discuss generalized linear models (GLM) for loss reserving, beginning with strong emphasis on the chain ladder. The chain ladder is formulated in a GLM context, as is the statistical distribution of the loss reserve. This structure is then used to test the need for departure from the chain ladder model and to consider natural extensions of the chain ladder model that lend themselves to the GLM framework.
This is a new edition of a very successful introduction to statistical methods for general insurance practitioners. No prior statistical knowledge is assumed, and the mathematical level required is approximately equivalent to school mathematics. Whilst the book is primarily introductory, the authors discuss some more advanced topics, including simulation, calculation of risk premiums, credibility theory, estimation of outstanding claim provisions and risk theory. All topics are illustrated by examples drawn from general insurance, and references for further reading are given. Solutions to most of the exercises are included. For the new edition the opportunity has been taken to make minor improvements and corrections throughout the text, to rewrite some sections to improve clarity, and to update the examples and references. A new section dealing with estimation has also been added.