Here we highlight recent GC Capital Ideas stories on enterprise risk management. 

Guy Carpenter Launches MetaRisk® 7.1: Guy Carpenter today announced the release of MetaRisk® 7.1, the latest version of the firm’s premier risk and capital management decision making tool. The platform offers access to a variety of new features and enhancements that will improve usability, increase overall functionality and enable the development of more accurate and efficient risk and capital models.

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Risk Preference Function - Embedding Risk-Reward in Capital Allocation: Capital allocation decisions are among the most important decisions made by company management. Through our own research and thought leadership and our observance of best practices at clients around the world, Guy Carpenter’s Enterprise Risk Management Advisory practice has compiled a set of leading practices around capital allocation for (re)insurers.

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Guy Carpenter today announced the release of MetaRisk® 7.1, the latest version of the firm’s premier risk and capital management decision making tool. The platform offers access to a variety of new features and enhancements that will improve usability, increase overall functionality and enable the development of more accurate and efficient risk and capital models.

Continue reading…

Here we review recent GC Capital Ideas’  top stories on capital management. 

Risk Preference Function - Embedding Risk-Reward in Capital Allocation:  Capital allocation decisions are among the most important decisions made by company management. Through our own research and thought leadership and our observance of best practices at clients around the world, Guy Carpenter’s Enterprise Risk Management Advisory practice has compiled a set of leading practices around capital allocation for (re)insurers.

Read the article >>

Adapting to an Evolving Market of More Permanent Capital Market Capacity: A new capital management paradigm is challenging the traditional reinsurance model. Historically, significant market losses from major catastrophic events and low investment yields were a catalyst for an improved rate environment. Faced with current economic conditions, reinsurers are finding it more difficult to generate adequate returns in excess of their cost of capital, and are seeing an increased competitive threat from alternative capacity from the capital markets. New money appears to be more permanent and therefore limits the firmness and duration of any improved rate environment.

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*Securities or investments, as applicable are offered in the US through GC Securities, a division of MMC Securities Corp. (”MMCSC”), a US registered broker-dealer and member FINRA/SIPC. Main office: 1166 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10036. Phone: 212.345.5000. Securities or investments, as applicable, are offered in the European Union by GC Securities, a division of MMC Securities (Europe) Ltd., which is authorized and regulated by the Financial Services Authority.

Guy Carpenter has published its second annual Insurance Risk Benchmarks, a resource designed to help insurers assess risk parameters and improve economic capital modeling. The report provides benchmarks for underwriting and reserve risk by line of business and by industry segment for U.S. exposures, and can be used by insurers when benchmarking their economic capital models.

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November 12, 2012: Guy Carpenter & Company announces that three members of its actuarial team have been awarded the 2011 Variance Prize for thought leadership in risk valuation, underwriting cycle modeling and risk benchmarks for the property-casualty market. The prize recognizes the best papers published to Variance, the scientific journal of the Casualty Actuarial Society.

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Donald Mango, Head of Global Advisory
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Capital allocation decisions are among the most important decisions made by company management. Through our own research and thought leadership and our observance of best practices at clients around the world, Guy Carpenter’s Enterprise Risk Management Advisory practice has compiled a set of leading practices around capital allocation for (re)insurers.

Continue reading…

Here we review the top GC Capital Ideas stories that have covered reserves in the last year.

MetaRisk® Reserve^TM: How to Get Ahead of the Reserving Cycle: The impact of claims inflation on eroding returns is among the most vexing challenges that insurers face. Getting ahead of the reserving cycle would be a significant competitive advantage, but many carriers do not have the right tools at their disposal. As a result, the ability to hit target return on equity (ROE) levels is put at risk, and firm value hangs in the balance.

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Reserving Cycle Analysis Suggests Tightening Ahead: In recent years there has been a steady stream of reserve releases from insurers, which helped support financial results in the face of a weakening market and significant catastrophe losses. Heading into 2012, Guy Carpenter’s analysis of the reserving cycle suggests that the tide may be turning, and we may be heading into a period of reserve shortfalls.

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Guy Carpenter Publishes First Industry Risk Benchmarks Report: Guy Carpenter announced publication of its first Industry Risk Benchmarks report, which provides risk benchmarks for loss ratios and reserves, by line of business, for coefficient of variation (standard deviation/mean), correlation and cycles.

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Workers Compensation Reserve Risk Development: The Cat That May Be Lurking in Your Balance Sheet: Sudden natural disasters such as the tragic Tohoku earthquake in March are not the only catastrophes that can impact insurers’ balance sheets and policyholder surplus. Such well publicized natural catastrophes only account for about 10 percent of insurers’ notable capital and surplus impairments triggering regulatory action and concern. Of the remaining 90 percent, by far the single largest cause of impairments over the past 40 years (1969-2009) emanated from inadequate pricing and deficient loss reserves - resulting in approximately 40 percent of the cases.

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Chart: Property & Casualty Accident Year Reserve Development: Accident year loss experience is beginning to show signs of lower reserve margins. The chart below shows U.S. P&C industry reserve development by accident year since 2000. The reserving cycle is evident in the graph with adverse accident year loss development during the “soft market” years of 2000 and 2001 and favorable development between 2003 and 2007. The orange line in the graph shows the average initial loss ratio pick. The old reserving adage that “good years get better and bad years get worse” appears to be borne out here.

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Chart: Sustainability of Loss Reserves: Historically, one of the “big cats” has been sector under-reserving, which served as the backdrop for the last hard market. Over the last four years, reserve releases have featured prominently in the reinsurance sector and have continued to do so up until the third quarter of 2010. The chart below shows the contribution to reserve releases on the Guy Carpenter Bermuda Reinsurance Composite combined ratios from 2005. It is notable that the benefit from reserve releases has ticked up in the first nine months of 2010 by one full percentage point, to 8.8 points on the loss ratio. This has occurred during a year when many projected reserve releases would diminish.

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Chart: Incurred But Not Reported Levels a Measure of Reserving Trends: A clue which could point to a shift in reserving trends may be evident in U.S. P&C industry percentage of first year incurred but not reported (IBNR) figures, which, all else equal, is a measure of reserving conservatism. In the chart below, a trend of potentially diminishing conservatism can be seen. It is significant that the industry is, in aggregate, back to levels of around 30 percent - levels previously seen in the last soft market.

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Don Mango, Head of Global Advisory
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In recent years there has been a steady stream of reserve releases from insurers, which helped support financial results in the face of a weakening market and significant catastrophe losses. Heading into 2012, Guy Carpenter’s analysis of the reserving cycle suggests that the tide may be turning, and we may be heading into a period of reserve shortfalls.

Continue reading…

Guy Carpenter & Company, LLC announced publication of its first Industry Risk Benchmarks report, which provides risk benchmarks for loss ratios and reserves, by line of business, for coefficient of variation (standard deviation/mean), correlation and cycles.

Continue reading…

Guy Carpenter & Company has won an award for its thought leadership and innovative research in enterprise risk management (ERM) from the Joint Risk Management Section of the Casualty Actuarial Society, Canadian Institute of Actuaries and Society of Actuaries. Working with research firm Risk Lighthouse LLC, Guy Carpenter accepted the 2011 Award for Practical Risk Management Applications at the 2011 ERM Symposium, held March 14-16 in Chicago.

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