International Financial Reporting for Insurers

LEGEND
AICPA   American Institute of Certified Public Accountants
CAS      Casualty Actuarial Society
CIA       Canadian Institute of Actuaries
IAA       International Actuarial Association
IASB     International Accounting Standards Board
SOA      Society of Actuaries

EDITORS 

R. Thomas Herget, FSA, CERA, MAAA. Tom received his bachelor of arts degree in actuarial science from the University of Illinois. Tom worked for two insurers, a software enterprise, an academic research company, and two public accounting firms. He has extensive experience in financial reporting, project management, and valuations and is a frequent speaker and author. Tom is the coeditor of US GAAP for Life Insurers and Insurance Industry Mergers and Acquisitions. He has served as director of the American Academy of Actuaries (Academy) and the SOA. Tom has led many initiatives in the study of capital adequacy and earnings emergence.

Mike Lockerman, FSA, MAAA, CFA. Mike earned his BS with honors in mathematical sciences at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is a principal with PricewaterhouseCoopers in New York City. Mike focused on financial reporting and financial modeling for life and annuity insurers. He has been continually working for clients on IFRS 17 matters for the last several years. Mike has provided financial reporting consulting services for most of the 20 largest life and annuity insurers over his career, has worked in more than two dozen countries, and has worked on IFRS conversions in more than 10 countries. He is a former member of the SOA International Section Council and is a member of the Academy Financial Reporting Council.

James B. Milholland, FSA, MAAA. Jim earned his BA in mathematics at Davidson College and his MS in mathematics at University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee. Jim was the founder of Milholland Actuarial Consulting. Previously, he was at EY, initially in Denver and later serving as a partner in Atlanta and London. While at EY, Jim held the CPA designation. His clients included multina- tional insurers with locations in six continents. Jim had extensive experience with global insurers in financial reporting matters, including converting to IFRS Phase I, and in insurance mergers and acquisitions. He was a frequent writer on accounting topics, most notably revenue recogni- tion under IFRS for insurance contracts. Jim served as the SOA representative to the Insurance Accounting Committee of the International Actuarial Association.

AUTHORS
Jennifer D. Austin, CPA. Jennifer is a graduate of Truman State University and holds a BS in accountancy and a master’s of accountancy. Jennifer is a KPMG audit partner in the New York national office’s Department of Professional Practice, primarily focusing on the insurance industry. Jennifer identifies and addresses emerging accounting and auditing issues related to insurance and consulting with engagement teams on complex and emerging accounting, auditing, and SEC matters. She has more than 20 years of experience at KPMG, serving the insurance industry, including property and casualty, life and annuity, accident and health, and P&C and life reinsurance companies. Jennifer is the US member of KPMG’s Global Insurance Topic Team and KPMG’s representative on the AICPA Insurance Expert Panel.

Rajiv Basu, CPA. Rajiv has been with Deloitte for more than 35 years and has served in its London, Baltimore, Mumbai, and New York offices. Rajiv is a firm-designated life insurance specialist with extensive experience in serving large financial institutions and SEC registrants and in insurance M&A transactions. In the role of leading Deloitte’s US insurance IFRS services practice, he has convened client roundtables, supervised the issuance of firm publications on the IASB’s insurance contracts project, and participated in the firm’s response team to the boards. Rajiv is an extensive speaker on the subject at client and industry forums. He received an MA (honors) in economics from the Birla Institute of Technology and Sciences, Pilani, India. Rajiv is a fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales, a CPA in New York and Oregon, and a member of the AICPA.

Bryan C. Benjamin, CPA,  CGMA. Bryan is a graduate of  Michigan State University,  with     a bachelor degree in accounting and a master’s in accounting and reporting. He is a partner at Deloitte & Touche in New York City. Bryan focuses on advising CFOs, controllers, and finance teams at large and complex insurance organizations. He helps lead Deloitte’s services around both IFRS 17 and targeted improvements for long duration contracts (LDTI). Bryan previously served as a practitioner in Deloitte’s national office, where he worked closely with the FASB, IASB, other standard setters, and regulators in developing Deloitte technical accounting viewpoints and guid- ance. In this role, he helped drive the firm’s efforts around financial reporting issues related to insurance contracts, financial instruments, and valuation.

Steve Cheung, FSA, FSAHK. Steve earned his BBA in insurance, financial, and actuarial analysis at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, with a minor in psychology at the American University, Washington, DC. He is partner of EY Financial Services Consulting, based in Hong Kong, and the EY Global IFRS 17 technical panel member. During his actuarial consulting experience, Steve has helped clients in the Asia-Pacific in implementing various financial reporting bases, including IFRS 17, US GAAP, purchase price allocation, and embedded value.  He  has also helped clients to align IFRS 17 subledger system implementation and deterministic/stochastic actuarial modeling with their reporting requirements. He is a frequent speaker and author and chairperson of the Financial Reporting Committee, and a former council member of the Actuarial Society of Hong Kong (ASHK). Steve has served as the ASHK representative to the Insurance Accounting Committee of the IAA.

Robert G. Frasca, FSA, MAAA. Rob earned an SB in mathematics and an SB in economics at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Rob is a principal at Ernst & Young, Boston. He has an extensive background in various bases of accounting, including US GAAP, US statutory, Canadian GAAP, and IFRS. His experience includes financial reporting for insurance companies, auditing insurance company financial statements, and assisting consulting clients in the implementation  of emerging accounting and actuarial standards. Previously, Rob worked at Sun Life Financial and New England Mutual Life Insurance Company. Clients include major insurance companies, investment firms, and insurance regulators. He has served on the Academy’s Financial Reporting and Life Financial Reporting Committees and is a former chair of the SOA’s Financial Reporting Section Council.

Laura Shaeffer Gray, FSA, MAAA. Laura earned her BA at Agnes Scott College. She is a principal at KPMG, based in Atlanta. Laura has more than twenty years of insurance industry experience, including product development and financial reporting at direct writers, as well as consulting and auditing experience. Among her particular areas of focus are helping companies prepare for and implement new accounting standards, including US GAAP, IFRS, and PBR; implementing and executing model risk management programs; and conducting actuarial trans- formation initiatives. Prior employers include Confederation Life, Canada Life, EY, and Marietta Actuarial Services. Laura is a member of the Academy’s Financial Reporting Committee and a former member of the Academy’s Life Financial Reporting Committee.

William C. Hines, FSA, MAAA. William earned his BBA in finance from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. He is principal and consulting actuary at Milliman in Wakefield, Massachusetts. William regularly consults with clients of all sizes throughout the world on public-company accounting issues, including US GAAP and IFRS. He has authored numerous white papers on IFRS accounting for insurance and presented original research to the IASB’s Insurance Working Group, board members, and staff and was appointed as an official observer to the IASB’s IFRS 17 Transition Resources Group. William has supported clients with IFRS-related projects that include direct writers, captives, and reinsurers; monoline and well-diversified insurers; and insurers domiciled in the United States, Europe, Asia, South America, Canada, Bermuda, and  the Caribbean. He has served as chairperson of the IAA Insurance Accounting Committee and as chairperson of the Academy’s Financial Reporting Committee and its IFRS Task Force.

Elaine Claire Hultzer, CPA, CA SA. Elaine graduated from the University of Cape Town, South Africa, with a bachelor of commerce (honors) degree and a bachelor of science in medicine. She  is a partner at Deloitte in Toronto. Elaine has been involved in the interpretation of IFRS 17 and various exposure drafts since the commencement of its development through several insurance industry, accounting, and actuarial forums in Canada and elsewhere globally. Elaine provides IFRS 17 technical accounting advisory and assurance services to insurers in North America, as well as IFRS 17 education and training sessions to clients and fellow professionals. She worked previously with Deloitte South Africa, KPMG New Zealand, and Deloitte Canada, serving clients in audit and advisory roles during the past 10 years, including large listed Canadian global life insurers, a large listed property and casualty insurer; insurance subsidiaries of global banks, non-stock insurers, and medium- to small-size life and non-life insurers. Elaine is a member of the Canadian Accounting Standards Board’s IFRS 17 transition resource group, a Deloitte member of the OSFI insurance advisory panel and IFRS 17 working group; a member of the Deloitte global IFRS 17 steering committee, and leader of auditability of IFRS 17.

Rich Isherwood, FSA, CERA, MAAA, FIA. Rich earned a bachelor of science in mathematics at Cardiff University, UK. He is vice president and head of actuarial reporting and forecasting at Pacific Life, driving the enterprise-level actuarial analyses across GAAP, statutory, and economic reporting bases. Prior to joining Pacific Life, Rich spent nearly 15 years with PwC, working across the UK and US life insurance industries. He has focused the majority of his career on financial reporting and risk management for long-term insurers and reinsurers. Rich has helped various  US insurers implement large accounting change programs under GAAP and IFRS, covering both the financial and operational impacts of the implementation. He has also led teams and conducted illustrative financial modeling under both standards for a range of US life and annuity products. He has presented at a number of industry events, including SOA and Academy webinars on IFRS 17.

Gareth Kennedy, ACAS, MAAA. Gareth holds his master of physics (honors) from Lancaster University in the United Kingdom. He is executive director at Ernst & Young in Chicago. Gareth has extensive experience in reserving for personal and commercial lines insurance/reinsurance companies in both assurance and advisory capacities. He developed EY’s valuation approach to fair valuing insurance general insurance liabilities under both purchase price allocations and the evolving area of structured investments in insurance-linked securities. Gareth has performed research, presented at actuarial conferences, and written articles on the possible effects for insur- ance companies upon the adoption of IFRS 17. Furthermore, he has provided accounting change diagnostic services to insurance companies. Gareth currently serves as chair of the Academy’s Financial Reporting Committee. He is the CAS representative to the IAA Accounting Committee and is also a member of the CAS Accounting Changes Committee.

Jeffrey A. Klanderman, FSA, MAAA. Jeff graduated  from  the  Virginia  Polytechnic  Institute and State University, where he earned his BS in mathematics. Jeff has more than 25 years of consulting experience covering many aspects of financial reporting, actuarial modeling, and risk management. Jeff has provided audit support (US GAAP, IFRS, statutory) to several domestic and international companies at PwC and at KPMG. Jeff has produced numerous articles and thought leadership pieces and is a frequent speaker at SOA meetings and other professional actuarial events.

Mike Lombardi, FSA, CERA, FCIA, MAAA. Mike earned his bachelor of science degree  with honors in mathematics from McGill University. Mike is president of MLBC, an insurance consulting firm in Toronto. Prior to forming MLBC, he was executive vice president, European acquisitions, at RGA. Before joining RGA, Mike was the managing principal for the Canadian insurance consulting practice at Tillinghast (now Willis Towers Watson). In this role, he provided advice on mergers and acquisitions and embedded value and served as appointed actuary for several companies. Mike has frequently presented on financial reporting topics at industry meetings, including those of the SOA and the CIA. Mike is a former chair of the CIA Appointed Actuary Committee and a former member of the IAA Insurance Accounting Committee. He also chaired the CIA’s International Council, which monitors IFRS developments, approves delegates to IAA committees, and reviews responses to relevant IASB discussion papers and exposure drafts. Mike served as president of the CIA and president of the SOA.

Marc Oberholtzer, FCAS, MAAA. Marc holds a BA in economics earned at Rutgers University. He is a principal at PricewaterhouseCoopers. Marc has extensive experience in general insurance financial reporting, supporting financial statement conversions and leading actuarial modeling and education sessions around IFRS 17. He leads PwC’s US general insurance actuarial practice in col- laborating with its accounting advisory experts, national office professionals, and global technical accounting group with regard to how IFRS 17 affects general insurance. Marc has experience advising or auditing nearly every major general insurance company operating in the United States. Marc served on the board of the Academy, led the Academy’s Committee on Property/Liability Financial Reporting for three years, served on the Academy’s IFRS committee, and served for four years as the representative of the CAS on the IAA Insurance Accounting Committee.

Lela K. Patrik, FCAS, MAAA. Lela holds a BA from Swarthmore College and is a director at PricewaterhouseCoopers in Philadelphia. She has assisted clients with implementing insurance accounting changes—including gap assessments, pro forma modeling, and technical accounting interpretation. In particular, she has built out IFRS 17 pro forma models and PAA eligibility templates for companies, which are both tailored to the unique features of the underlying products, with flexibility for sensitivity testing. In doing so, she has worked hand-in-hand with companies to identify the information needed to support the modeling, adjustments to underlying assumptions, and opportunities within the guidance to apply alternative assumptions/methodologies. Lela has led actuarial teams for some of PwC’s largest P&C clients with global insurance and reinsurance operations—both in an audit-capacity role and accounting advisory support. She is a frequent speaker at Casualty Actuarial Society meetings and other professional actuarial events.

Leonard Joseph Reback, FSA, MAAA. Len earned his BS in accounting from Binghamton University and holds an MS in statistics and operations research from New York University Stern School of Business Administration. Len is a vice president and actuary at MetLife. He is a valuation actuary with experience in many aspects of financial reporting, including cash flow testing, asset liability management, amortization of intangibles, fair value calculations, implementations of SOP 03-1, SOP 05-1, FAS 157, and FAS 159, and various purchase accounting exercises. He has provided education sessions to the IASB and FASB. Len is a former chair of the Academy’s Life Financial Reporting Committee and the Academy Financial Reporting Committee.

Hui Shan, FSA, CERA, MAAA. Hui  earned a PhD from the University of Connecticut. He is a principal at Deloitte Consulting in Hartford, CT. Hui specializes in financial reporting with a primary focus on advising insurers in their transition to emerging standards, such  as IFRS 17  and LDTI, in areas including policy interpretation, financial impact assessment, actuarial model migration, and subledger implementation. Hui has served a broad spectrum of US and international clients, including both life insurers, property and casualty insurers, and captives. He is a frequent presenter at industry conferences and a volunteer at the SOA and Academy.

Henry Siegel, FSA, MAAA. Henry earned his BA in mathematics from Cornell University. Now semiretired, Henry was vice president of the New York Life Insurance Company, responsible for corporate oversight of actuarial aspects of financial reporting for all businesses. Henry was an active member of industry groups commenting on insurance accounting developments, including the Group of North American Insurance Entities and the HUB group. He was also one of  two actuaries on the IASB’s Insurance Working Group. He was vice president of the Academy’s Risk Management and Financial Reporting Council, chair of the Academy’s Financial Reporting Committee, and chair of the SOA Financial Reporting Section Council. He has been the Academy’s representative to the IAA’s Insurance Accounting Committee.

Roger W. Smith, FSA, CERA, MAAA. Roger earned his BA in mathematics from the University of Michigan. Roger is the president of PolySystems and is a principal owner in the firm. He has led the development of PolySystems’ actuarial applications from valuation systems to advanced projection modeling systems. Roger has developed systems to analyze experience to support FAS 97, FAS 120, and FAS 60 calculations and to help companies save money in maintaining complex actuarial systems. He has been involved in many installations of the company’s software and has led in the development of solutions for reinsurance reporting, cash flow testing, experience reporting, management accounting, and tax reporting. Roger is the former chair of the SOA Technology Section and was a member of the Academy’s Life Financial Reporting Committee. He has spoken at many SOA meetings on utilization of new technology to solve actuarial issues.

Jeremy Starr, FSA, MAAA. Jeremy holds a bachelor of arts, with majors in physics and mathe- matics, from Binghamton University. He is president of Jeremy Starr Consulting in New York City. Jeremy provided significant input to the IASB on reinsurance issues as chair of the Reinsurance Committee reviewing the final standard. He has worked for General Re, Lehman Brothers, Guardian Life, Urbaine Life Re, and Swiss Re. Jeremy is the former chair of the Academy, American Council of Life Insurers, and SOA Reinsurance Committees/Section. He is a member of the task force that wrote and updated Actuarial Standard of Practice (ASOP) 11. He chaired the subcommittee on the Academy’s practice note on risk transfer.

Stephen J. Strommen, FSA, CERA, MAAA. Steve earned his bachelor of business adminis- tration degree with a major in actuarial science at the University of Wisconsin. After a career at Northwestern Mutual, he is currently owner of Blufftop. Steve has more than 25 years of experience in corporate financial modeling. He has been a member of several Academy workgroups on principles-based reserves and a member of the Academy Financial Reporting Committee. Steve led the Academy’s International Accounting Standards Task Force in its response to the IASB’s second exposure draft of IFRS 17.

Randy E. Tillis, FSA, CERA, MAAA. Randy earned his BS in mathematics from Ohio State University. He is a manager at PwC in Chicago. Randy was instrumental in three SOA IFRS 17 research projects, beginning in 2008. He has worked with companies in the United States and Japan, including Aviva, AXA, Principal, Prudential US, and Sammons, regarding IFRS 17 issues. Randy is the former chair of the Academy’s Life Financial Reporting Committee and a former member of the Academy’s Risk Management and Financial Reporting Committee.

Darryl G. Wagner, FSA, MAAA. Darryl graduated from the University of Nebraska with a bachelor of science in mathematics. He is principal and Global Actuarial Practice leader for Deloitte in New York City. Darryl’s areas of specialty include life insurer financial reporting and performance/value measurement and management. He has worked within numerous accounting and valuation frameworks with clients around the world, helping with technical, process-oriented, and organizational aspects of implementation, execution, and evaluation. Darryl formerly worked for Arthur Andersen and CIGNA. His activities at the IAA include chair of the Advice and Assistance Committee, member of the Strategic Planning Committee, and coauthor of the IFRS Risk Adjustment monograph. With the SOA, Darryl was a vice president, board member, and International Section chair. He is a developer of and presenter at US GAAP and IFRS seminars.

Jennifer Weiner, CPA. Jennifer is a partner in Ernst & Young’s Financial Services Professional Practice Group. She is one of the principal technical resources on accounting and financial reporting matters to EY insurance professionals and clients and is a member of the EY global IFRS insurance technical panel. With more than 20 years of audit and advisory experience, she has served a variety of public, private, and foreign traded companies within the financial services industry, including property and casualty insurers, life insurers with traditional and variable products, health care organizations, and broker/dealers. From 2010 to 2013 Jennifer was a senior fellow at the FASB, where she was the lead project manager on the insurance contracts project. This involved working with the IASB to develop a new standard to improve the financial reporting for insurers and included writing technical papers and developing recommendations, presenting to the boards, and drafting the proposed Accounting Standard Update, Insurance Contracts. Jennifer is a graduate of the University of Illinois.

Tara J. P. Wolf, FSA, MAAA. Tara graduated from the University of Miami (Coral Gables, Florida) with a bachelor of arts in mathematics. She is a principal at Ernst & Young in New York City. Tara has been a consulting actuary for more than 20 years, working with life insurance companies on advanced financial reporting topics such as IFRS, US GAAP, and principles-based approaches. She has consulted with the majority of large US and global life insurance companies on projects related to financial reporting. Tara has served as the chair of the SOA Financial Reporting Section council and as editor of The Financial Reporter, the Financial Reporting Section’s newsletter.

Mark Yoest, FSA, MAAA. Mark holds a BA in mathematics from DePaul University. He is managing director with Deloitte Consulting in Chicago. Mark helps insurance executives with valuation, financial reporting and management, product strategy, analytics, and regulatory compliance. His experience includes the valuation, pricing, product development, risk management, and strategic operational review of group and accident and health insurance products. His clients include most of the top 20 group health and long-term care writers. Mark has presented at several SOA meetings on the topics of valuation, financial reporting, and IFRS and was a member of the Academy IFRS Task Force.