Articles

Search Results Page 1 of 118.

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 Next Last

Preparing your Funding Strategy Statement for 2025 valuation

Administering authorities will need to amend their Funding Strategy Statement (FSS) as part of the 2025 actuarial valuations to ensure it complies with new guidance published this year. The new FSS guidance, published in January 2025, was jointly produced by the Scheme Advisory Board (SAB), the Charted Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy (CIPFA), and the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG), titled “Guidance for Preparing and maintaining a Funding Strategy Statement”.
Posted on Friday Aug 8

Flood data can make motor insurance providers more resilient

After a property purchase, the biggest financial outlay for most U.K. households is usually the car. Replacing or repairing that precious and often essential asset in a collision is a given with the right level of insurance in place, but what about flood and growing weather risks consumers face? When it comes to flood risks, a car can be moved out of harm’s way, theoretically, or take an alternative route to avoid driving through flood water.
Posted on Thursday Aug 7

An Actuary's guide to business planning for 2026

As the capital modelling season reaches its peak, insurers are navigating a rapidly evolving risk landscape. Market conditions continue to soften, macroeconomic uncertainty persists, and climate risks are becoming more pronounced. Each of these will challenge the assumptions that underpin capital models, requiring a more flexible and forward-looking approach. This article highlights three key considerations for actuaries.
Posted on Tuesday Aug 5

UK equities is it time for with profits funds to go global

UK with-profits funds maintain a significant home bias, with listed equity allocations far exceeding the UK's 3.5% weight in the FTSE All-World Index. This bias is costing policyholders returns. In this article, we explore: the impact this bias has had on past performance; why UK with-profits funds favour an overweight to UK equities; and future relative performance of UK vs global equities.
Posted on Monday Aug 4

August 2025 Edition of the Actuarial Post Magazine

Firstly, many congratulations to the Lionesses for winning EUFA Women’s Euro 2025 and a special mention to Lucy Bronze for playing with a broken leg, I trust her health insurance will come into play. Meanwhile, we saw the launch of the new Pensions Commission, and the appointment of such a distinguished panel, including Baroness Drake whose legacy in shaping the UK’s retirement system is profound. They have their work cut out for them for them with issues abounding from auto-enrolment contributions, State Pension age and pension adequacy among them.
Posted on Friday Aug 1

How does QT feed into the DB pensions funding levels debate

Over the past three years, following 15 years of heavy deficits, defined benefit (DB) pension schemes have moved into surplus as government bond yields have increased. The durability of current pension scheme funding levels should not be taken for granted as they are highly linked to monetary policy. QT has undoubtedly had the effect of boosting DB pension scheme funding levels beyond where they might otherwise have been.
Posted on Friday Aug 1

AI A Practical Perspective for MGAs

Providing a practical look at how MGAs can use AI in meaningful ways. It explains what AI is, where it works well, and how it differs from traditional analytics. The presentation highlights real use cases, key challenges, and the steps MGAs can take to begin or expand their AI journey responsibly. At the end of the session, you will be able to

Define what AI is in practical terms
Describe where AI fits in P&C insurance
Summarise regulation and fairness around AI in insurance
Recall a list of tips for starting their journey with AI
Posted on Thursday Jul 31

The role of insurance in advancing nuclear energy

As the world accelerates its transition to low-carbon energy, nuclear power stands out as a reliable, carbon-free solution. Its ability to provide consistent baseload electricity makes it a cornerstone of sustainable energy strategies. However, the path forward for nuclear energy is shaped not only by technology and policy but also by the evolving role of insurance in managing risk and bank ability to enable growth.
Posted on Thursday Jul 31

What option prices reveal about future financial risk

Insurance companies are experts at using historical data to form views on possible future outcomes. These views are then used in a variety of ways from setting assumptions for calculating technical provisions and calibrating internal models, to assessing risk exposures and designing and evaluating hedging strategies. But what if there was a way to peer into the future rather than just the past? Option prices in financial markets can provide exactly that: forward-looking insights into probability distributions for financial risks.
Posted on Wednesday Jul 30

Retirement and what no one prepares you for

“This is an un-monitored email address”. This is just one of the brick walls I hit as I was trying to get my finances sorted for my retirement. I’ve spent years listening to pension scheme administrators present to my clients – covering performance against service level agreements, net promoter scores and details of client complaints. One administrator recently gave a fascinating and informative presentation to one of my clients on how they deal with vulnerable customers. Normally, an admin report will give a reasonably rosy picture.
Posted on Tuesday Jul 29

Severe convective storms are driving record insured losses

Severe convective storms are driving record insured losses in the United States and posing growing risks to solar farms. Innovative mitigation strategies and advanced risk assessments are vital for resilience. In 2024, insured losses from U.S. severe convective storms (SCSs) exceeded the $50 billion mark for the second consecutive year. This category of peril — which includes tornadoes, hail and straight-line winds — has grown increasingly prominent in recent years
Posted on Monday Jul 28

Flood Risk Insurance Losses

Flood risk is rising fast in Western & Southern Europe and the Middle East & Africa, costing insurers up to $ 11bn in 2024 alone. In this video, Nikhil da Victoria Lobo explores key regional insights from the latest NatCat Sigma report, including: Major flood events in Spain (Valencia) and Dubai. Why 70% of flood losses in Europe remain uninsured. The role of urbanization, climate change, and exposure accumulation. The urgent need for data-driven risk understanding and public-private partnerships. Learn how insurers and policymakers can better prepare for growing secondary perils in these high-risk regions.
Posted on Friday Jul 25

Smarter investment governance for DB schemes

Improved funding positions have opened the door for many defined benefit (DB) pension schemes to de-risk their investment strategies and move closer to their endgame. Whether targeting a risk transfer transaction or planning to run on with a low-risk strategy, this shift is prompting the question: is our investment governance model the best fit for our new circumstances? Many schemes use strategic advisers who also help their clients select investment managers on a bespoke basis.
Posted on Friday Jul 25

Creakonomics all it would take is a push

The concept of “financially material” risks, and whether you can take actions to deal with them, has never been more relevant. That makes your life hard as a pension scheme trustee. We firmly believe systemic risks are financially material; we all need to manage them better than we do currently, to protect our economy, our schemes and our members.
Posted on Thursday Jul 24

Equity. When you’ve got FX and you want it hedged its equity

FX hedging is a perennial question, in part because it’s often difficult to answer and the evidence is ambiguous. For lower risk assets, it makes sense to hedge FX. But what about equities? Equities introduce complications. Firstly, the revenues of companies in one index are rarely all in a single currency. The FTSE 100 is an obvious example of this, with a lot of mining firms whose earnings are effectively in USD.
Posted on Wednesday Jul 23

Cutting through the noise on surpluses in the LGPS

There has been a lot of buzz lately about surpluses in the LGPS. You might have heard stories about billions of unused pounds trapped in the various pension funds that could be much better used helping local councils navigate their tight budgets. With the 2025 valuation in England and Wales currently underway, we want to share our view on the current discussion to manage expectations and avoid disappointment. Before we dig into the technical details let’s have a look at some undisputed facts.
Posted on Tuesday Jul 22

The risks of being paid (exactly) your pension

We explore the potential drawbacks of a narrow 'contractual' approach, particularly in the context of the UK’s fiscal trajectory and the possibility of continued high inflation. The purpose of a pension scheme is to support people in retirement. In today's evolving economic environment, simply aiming to pay contractual benefits may not always be sufficient to achieve this goal. There are potential limitations of a narrow 'contractual' mission in the context of the UK's fiscal outlook and the possibility of persistently high inflation.
Posted on Monday Jul 21

TPR Year 2 Update on Corporate Plan 2024 to 2027

The Pensions Regulator (TPR) publishes latest Corporate Plan and Annual Report and Accounts. Driving up trusteeship standards, delivering value for savers and encouraging the development of safe pathways that lead to good retirement outcomes are at the heart of TPR's latest corporate plan. TPR’s 2025/26 Corporate Plan sets out how it is helping to prepare the industry for the transformative impact of the new Pension Schemes Bill, which promises to reshape the pensions market across both defined contribution (DC) and defined benefit (DB) schemes.
Posted on Friday Jul 18

Will the State Pension ever be means tested

The United Kingdom’s state pension system is under mounting pressure, with demographic trends and fiscal realities threatening its sustainability. A recent report by the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) has brought renewed urgency to the debate. As the Labour government faces difficult fiscal decisions, they may soon be forced to either raise the pension age, scale back payments, or introduce means-testing to keep the system viable.
Posted on Thursday Jul 17

Customer data linking in the fight against fraud

The Insurance Fraud Bureau (IFB) recently reported it had seen a 50% rise in ghost broking in the past two years . While this is just one type of insurance fraud, it underlines the pressure on the insurance market to prevent and detect fraud at all stages of the insurance lifecycle from quote to claim. Yet efforts to spot fraudulent applications and identify high risk policies can be hampered due to disconnected and inaccurate customer data. In simple terms, insurance providers need to unlock the power of the customer data they already hold in the fight against fraud.
Posted on Wednesday Jul 16

One year after Labour elected how may pensions be affected

It's been a year since Labour came to power. In their election manifesto, they promised not to raise taxes on "working people," specifically income tax, national insurance, or VAT. However, following the recent climbdown on welfare changes, a large hole has been left in the government’s spending plans. This has fuelled speculation that Chancellor Rachel Reeves may need to raise taxes or announce spending cuts in her Autumn Budget, with pensions and wider savings seen as a possible target.
Posted on Tuesday Jul 15

Subsidence The Past, Present and Future

Nikki Randawa from Innovation Group will lead a roundtable discussion alongside a panel of industry experts, exploring the evolving landscape of subsidence. The session will provide a brief overview of the history of subsidence, examine the current challenges facing the industry, and offer insight into future developments and what lies ahead.
Posted on Monday Jul 14

Examining cyber security risks in a volatile environment

Businesses face a complex cyber security landscape. A multi-layered approach minimises financial, operational and reputational impacts. Strategies must adapt to evolving threats and business needs. The cyber security risk landscape in the United Kingdom (UK) has come to the fore recently following a number of cyber attacks on high street retailers. It may feel that the UK is being targeted by cyber criminals but it is not alone, cyber crime is a global challenge.
Posted on Monday Jul 14

Pension policy's long distance roadmap

The Pensions Schemes Bill has fired the starting pistol on a marathon set of proposals for pension change. The passage of the Pension Schemes Bill and the rules and regulations that will follow mean that major changes are unlikely to take effect before 2027, with the finishing line for some proposals set for 2030. These timescales will allow schemes the time they need to meet some of the requirements, especially around default arrangements.
Posted on Friday Jul 11

Guided Retirement Duty a promise or pipe dream for savers

The Pensions Policy Institute (PPI), sponsored by The Pensions Regulator (TPR), recently highlighted a key challenge for defined contribution (DC) pension savers, including those in SIPPs and workplace pensions - many people need more support and clearer guidance when it comes to choosing the right retirement income products. The PPI’s research report, Assessing the UK Retirement Income Market, explored how Value for Money (VfM) can be assessed during the decumulation stage of retirement.
Posted on Thursday Jul 10