During the last decade, the financial industry has faced several financial crises. Insurance supervisors have reacted by revising the existing regulatory frameworks as well as developing and implementing new solvency models. The economic research of the challenges to the insurance industry arising from these new regulatory systems is therefore an important and contemporary task. This doctoral thesis, which comprises four research papers, seeks to gain new insights into the field of regulation and the solvency assessment of insurance companies. The first paper "The Impact of Private Equity on a Life Insurer's Capital Charges under Solvency II and the Swiss Solvency Test" is an empirical analysis of the performance of the asset class private equity regarding both its risk-return profile and its impact on an insurer's capital requirements under the Solvency II framework of the European Union as well as Switzerland's Solvency Test. We review the standard market risk models and also propose an approach for an internal model. We show that although the risk-return profile of private equity suggests a solid performance in relation to various other asset classes, the standard approaches of Solvency II and the Swiss Solvency Test overly penalize the asset class in terms of capital requirements. The following two research papers pertain to the area of solvency assessment for insurance groups. The paper "Solvency Assessment for Insurance Groups in the United States and Europe - a Comparison of Regulatory Frameworks" is an overview and comparison of three innovative group solvency frameworks: the National Association of Insurance Commissioners approach of the United States, the group structure model of Switzerland, and the Solvency II proposal on group solvency assessment. This comparison is based on the recently established criteria for a thorough group solvency approach of the International Association of Insurance Supervisors' Issues Paper.

This book examines policy developments that have been occurring in the field of financial regulation and their implications for the insurance industry and markets. With UK and US contributors from academia and legal practice, this book will be essential reading for policy-makers, insurance regulators, insurance and legal professionals as well as students and academics researching and studying insurance law.

Master's Thesis from the year 2015 in the subject Business economics - Banking, Stock Exchanges, Insurance, Accounting, grade: -, University of Frankfurt (Main), language: English, abstract: The Solvency II Directive, which will come into effect from January 2016, is a very important project of the European insurance industry. It will set new rules to the European insurance business. Because of being the biggest insurance market of the world - European insurers generate more than € 1,100 bn p.a. and invest around € 8,600 bn in the economy - the new directive will also act as a signal for the worldwide regulation of insurance companies. So it is also intended to have a framework, which is in line with the international developments in solvency, risk management, supervisory and accounting. After 15 years of planning and development the regulation is now implemented step-by-step. The aim of the EU Solvency II Directive is to prevent insurers from becoming insolvent. For this purpose, among other things, a uniform capital adequacy for all European insurance companies is provided. Core of the proposed amendments with respect to the investment is that eligible capital at any time must be higher than the calculated risk. One of the main parts of the Solvency II project is the determination of the capital requirements. The idea is to asses both the assets and the liabilities with the aim of a more realistic modelling and assessments of the risk to which an insurer may be exposed to. The solvency capital requirements (SCR) for an one year horizon is then calculated on the 99.5% Value-at-Risk. The determined SCR answers the question how much capital is required today to cover losses, which may occur during the next 12 months, with a probability of 99.5%. For the calculation of the SCR the insurer can choose between standard model, internal models or a hybrid model. Since internal models allow a better assessment of the companies risk than the standard model, insurers are encouraged to implement such stochastic internal models. But the implementation of internal model is as well costly as sophisticated. That is why the European Commission with support of the Committee of Insurance and Occupational Pension Supervisors (CEIOPS) has established a scenario based standard model. The standard model defines in a first step different sub modules (e.g. market risk, operational risk) for which the capital requirements are calculated. The different SCR’s are “then aggregated under the assumption of a multivariate normal distribution with prespecified correlation matrices to allow for diversification effects”. [...]

A timeless classic of economic theory that remains fascinating and pertinent today, this is Frank Knight's famous explanation of why perfect competition cannot eliminate profits, the important differences between "risk" and "uncertainty," and the vital role of the entrepreneur in profitmaking. Based on Knight's PhD dissertation, this 1921 work, balancing theory with fact to come to stunning insights, is a distinct pleasure to read. FRANK H. KNIGHT (1885-1972) is considered by some the greatest American scholar of economics of the 20th century. An economics professor at the University of Chicago from 1927 until 1955, he was one of the founders of the Chicago school of economics, which influenced Milton Friedman and George Stigler.

This paper explores the relation between capital and risk in the life insurance industry in the period after the adoption of life risk-based capital (RBC) regulation. To examine this issue, we use a simultaneous-equation partial-adjustment model. Three equations express the interrelations among capital and two measures of risk: product risk and asset risk. The asset-risk measure used in this paper reflects credit or solvency risk as in RBC. Product risk assessment for life insurance products is rationalized by transaction-cost economics - contractual uncertainty.A significant finding is that for life insurers the relation between capital and asset risk is positive. This agrees with prior studies for the property/casualty insurance industry and some banking studies. But the relation between capital and product risk is negative. This is consistent with the hypothesized impact of guarantee funds in other studies. The contrast between the positive relation of capital to asset risk and the negative relation of capital to product risk underscores the importance of distinguishing these two components of risk.