March 2019

17Mar

Actuarial Finance: Derivatives, Quantitative Models and Risk Management

By Mathieu Boudreault, Jean-Francois RenaudA Drs. Boudreault and Renaud answer the need for a clear, application-oriented guide to the growing field of actuarial finance with this volume, which focuses on the mathematical models and techniques used in actuarial finance for the pricing and hedging of actuarial liabilities exposed to financial markets and other contingencies. With roots in modern financial mathematics, actuarial finance presents unique challenges due to the long-term nature of insurance liabilities, the presence of mortality or other contingencies...

March 17, 2019
Books, Investing, Management,
Read more...

December 2018

03Dec

Downhill from Here: Retirement Insecurity in the Age of Inequality

By Katherine S Newman As millions of Baby Boomers reach their golden years, the state of retirement in America is little short of a disaster. Nearly half the households with people aged 55 and older have no retirement savings at all. The real estate crash wiped out much of the home equity that millions were counting on to support their retirement. And the typical Social Security check covers less than 40% of pre-retirement wages--a number projected to drop to under...

December 3, 2018
Books, Pension design, Savings, ,
Read more...

October 2018
16Oct

Stars Aligning For Corporate Plans to Take De-Risking Actions

The market volatility experienced in early to mid-October speaks to the importance of plan sponsors having a governance structure and framework in place to effectuate changes to their portfolios in a timely manner when funded levels rise. As we have seen in prior periods, improvements in funded status can dissipate quickly if portfolios are not adjusted to reduce asset and liability mismatches. A well-funded or even fully funded plan can still carry substantial risk for the sponsor if plan...

October 16, 2018
Articles, Corporate Governance, Pension design, , ,
Read more...
05Oct

Survey of the Kenyan Private Equity and Venture Capital Landscape

By Shanthi Divakaran (World Bank), Patrick McGinnis (World Bank), Sam Schneider (Independent) This paper discusses the landscape for private equity and venture capital financing in Kenya. It provides an overview of the private equity and venture capital market in the country, describing key players, including funds, fund managers, investors, and public sector entities. The paper provides an analysis of key market drivers and impediments, as well as legal/regulatory/taxation drivers and impediments that affect Kenya's private equity and venture capital industry. ...

October 5, 2018
Articles, Investing, , ,
Read more...

September 2018

08Sep

Latin American Local Capital Markets: Challenges and Solutions

By Mauro Miranda (CFA Institute Research Foundation) Economic growth depends on the efficient allocation of resources, including the two main factors of production: labor and capital. Markets, operating on each factor, have allocated these resources in economies worldwide in ways that arguably approach optimality and have fostered economic development for the benefit of billions. Capital markets, both for debt and equity securities, have allowed firms to secure funding for productive uses while providing investors with opportunities for portfolio diversification. The...

September 8, 2018
Articles, Investing, , ,
Read more...

August 2018

25Aug

Graying of U.S. Bankruptcy: Fallout from Life in a Risk Society

By Deborah Thorne (University of Idaho), Pamela Foohey (Indiana University Maurer School of Law), Robert M. Lawless (University of Illinois College of Law) & Katherine M. Porter (University of California - Irvine School of Law) The social safety net for older Americans has been shrinking for the past couple decades. The risks associated with aging, reduced income, and increased healthcare costs, have been off-loaded onto older individuals. At the same time, older Americans are increasingly likely to file consumer bankruptcy,...

August 25, 2018
Aging, Articles, , , , ,
Read more...
25Aug

Population Aging, Social Security and Fiscal Limits

By Burkhard Heer (University of Augsburg; CESifo (Center for Economic Studies and Ifo Institute)), Vito Polito (Cardiff Business School) & Michael Wickens (University of Cardiff; Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR); Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR); CESifo (Center for Economic Studies and Ifo Institute)) We study the sustainability of pension systems using a life-cycle model with distortionary taxation that sets an upper limit to the real value of tax revenues. This limit implies an endogenous threshold dependency ratio, i.e. a point...

August 25, 2018
Aging, Articles, Labor Market, Slider-Left, Sustainability, System Sustainability, ,
Read more...
18Aug

Financial Fraud among Older Americans: Evidence and Implications

By Marguerite DeLiema, Martha Deevy, Annamaria Lusardi, Olivia S. Mitchell The consequences of poor financial capability at older ages are serious and include making mistakes with credit, spending retirement assets too quickly, and being defrauded by financial predators. Because older persons are at or past the peak of their wealth accumulation, they are often the targets of fraud. Our project analyzes a module we developed and fielded in the 2016 Health and Retirement Study (HRS). Using this dataset, we evaluate...

August 18, 2018
Aging, Articles, Labor Market, Savings, Slider-Left, ,
Read more...

June 2018

11Jun

Optimal Risk-Sharing in Pension Funds When Stock and Labor Markets are Co-Integrated

By Ilja Boelaars (University of Chicago) & Roel Mehlkopf (Tilburg University) A well established believe in the pension industry is that collective pension funds should take more stock market risk (compared to individual retirement accounts) since risk may be shared with future generations. We extend the OLG model of Gollier (2008) by adding labor income risk in the spirit of Benzoni, Collin-Dufresne, and Goldstein (2007) and show that this idea may be misguided. For the empirical range of parameter values...

June 11, 2018
Articles, Investing, Labor Market, , ,
Read more...
04Jun

Systemic Risk: A Practitioner’s Guide to Measurement, Management and Analysis

By Malcolm H.D. Kemp Systemic Risk provides readers with a wide-ranging practical guide to systemic risk in the financial system. It challenges the notion that systemic risk is exclusively about interconnectivities within the financial system, showing that past systemic risk crises have often involved a broader range of vulnerabilities. It describes how regulators and governments are seeking to manage systemic risk, and how their concerns are driving change in regulatory and business environments across the financial sector. It sets out how...

June 4, 2018
Books, Management, Regulation,
Read more...