Efficient versus inefficient hedging strategies in the presence of financial and longevity (value at) risk

This paper provides a closed-form Value-at-Risk (VaR) for the net exposure of an annuity provider, taking into account both mortality and interest-rate risk, on both assets and liabilities. It builds a classical risk-return frontier and shows that hedging strategies–such as the transfer of longevity risk–may increase the overall risk while decreasing expected returns, thus resulting in inefficient outcomes. Once calibrated to the 2010 UK longevity and bond market, the model gives conditions under which hedging policies become inefficient.