The changing social, financial and regulatory frameworks, such as an increasingly aging society, the current low interest rate environment, as well as the implementation of Solvency II, lead to the search for new product forms for private pension provision. In order to address the various...

Investors and insurance policyholders are often confronted with complex products and providers' opaque organisational structures. At the same time, the possibility that their claims will not be honoured often poses an existential risk. Financial regulation therefore aims at putting in place a...

Nach den Terrorattacken vom 11. September sehen sich die privaten Erst- und Rückversicherer mit einer völlig veränderten Risikolage konfrontiert, die sie bisher bei ihren Kalkulationen außer Acht ließen. Dr. Michael Wolgast, Gesamtverband der Deutschen Versicherungswirtschaft, schlägt...

A life care annuity is a bundled insurance product comprised of a life annuity and long-term care insurance. Some recent studies find the two risks - longevity risk and long-term care risk - to be opposing and thus life care annuities advantageous in regard to pooling the two risks. Based on...

Life insurers sell savings contracts with surrender options, which allow policyholders to prematurely receive guaranteed surrender values. These surrender options move toward the money when interest rates rise. Hence, higher interest rates raise surrender rates, as we document empirically by...

Die Dissertation besteht aus drei thematisch zusammenhängenden Forschungspapieren, in denen zeitstetige Konsum-, Investment- und Versicherungsprobleme über den Lebenszyklus betrachtet werden. Ein besonderer Fokus liegt auf realistischen Features wie stochastischem Sterberisiko und...

Low interest rates are becoming a threat to the stability of the life insurance industry, especially in countries such as Germany, where products with relatively high guaranteed returns sold in the past still represent a prominent share of the total portfolio. This contribution aims to assess...

This paper compares the shareholder-value-maximizing capital structure and pricing policy of insurance groups against that of stand-alone insurers. Groups can utilise intra-group risk diversification by means of capital and risk transfer instruments. We show that using these instruments enables...