Investment Management for Insurance Professionals Training Course

Participants can interpret liability features and convert them into investment-relevant cash-flow and risk requirements.

• Projected liability cash flows by timing, certainty, currency and inflation
• Duration, convexity and key-rate exposures embedded within insurance liabilities
• Claims development patterns for short-tail and long-tail insurance business
• Policyholder behaviour assumptions: lapses, surrenders, renewals and withdrawals
• Guarantees and embedded options affecting liability sensitivity to market movements
• Creating a liability profile for strategic asset allocation inputs

Participants can formulate a strategic asset allocation using return objectives and insurance-specific constraints.

• Strategic asset allocation objectives under liability, capital and liquidity constraints
• Capital market assumptions: expected return, volatility, correlation and inflation
• Mean-variance optimisation and its limitations for insurance balance sheets
• Asset-class roles within income, growth, matching and liquidity portfolios
• Translating allocation ranges into target weights and rebalancing bands
• Documenting allocation assumptions for investment committee approval

Participants can assess asset-liability mismatches and identify appropriate management responses.

• Asset-liability management objectives for earnings, solvency and policyholder security
• Duration-gap analysis using asset and liability modified duration
• Cash-flow matching for predictable benefit and claims payment schedules
• Immunisation conditions: duration matching, convexity and yield-curve shifts
• Key-rate duration analysis for non-parallel interest-rate movements
• Mismatch limits, hedging triggers and asset-liability committee reporting

Participants can construct fixed-income matching portfolios and assess residual interest-rate risk.

• Government bond curves, swap curves and discount-rate selection
• Building bond ladders against expected liability payment dates
• Yield-curve scenarios: parallel shifts, steepening, flattening and twists
• Reinvestment risk measured against contractual cash-flow requirements
• Callable bonds and mortgage exposures under declining interest rates
• Hedging residual duration exposure with interest-rate swaps and futures

Participants can evaluate credit assets and set portfolio controls for default and spread risk.

• Corporate bond spread components: default, liquidity, term and risk premium
• Credit ratings, internal scores and limitations of rating-agency opinions
• Expected loss calculated from probability, exposure and loss-given-default
• Credit migration analysis for downgrade risk and capital pressure
• Issuer, sector and counterparty concentration limits within credit portfolios
• Covenant review, seniority and security analysis for private debt

Participants can assess the role and risks of listed growth assets within insurer portfolios.

• Equity return drivers: earnings growth, valuation change, dividends and currency
• Strategic versus tactical equity allocations within insurer risk budgets
• Factor exposures: value, quality, momentum, size and low volatility
• Listed infrastructure and real estate investment trust cash-flow characteristics
• Equity stress testing under recession, inflation shock and market drawdown
• Setting equity limits consistent with solvency and earnings-volatility tolerance

Participants can assess whether private assets fit an insurer's liability profile, capital position and governance capacity.

• Private credit structures: direct lending, infrastructure debt and asset-backed finance
• Real estate underwriting: income yield, vacancy, refinancing and valuation risk
• Infrastructure investment cash flows, concessions and regulatory considerations
• Illiquidity premium assessment against lock-up, valuation and exit constraints
• J-curve effects, capital calls and distributions in private equity
• Due diligence requirements for valuation policies and fund governance

Participants can develop liquidity controls that account for claims, collateral calls and stressed asset sales.

• Liquidity sources ranked by certainty, timing, cost and market capacity
• Claims-payment forecasts linked to premium inflows and operating cash needs
• Liquidity coverage metrics for normal conditions and stressed scenarios
• Collateral management for derivatives, securities lending and repurchase agreements
• Fire-sale risk from forced disposals during market dislocation
• Contingency funding plans with triggers, actions and accountable owners

Participants can evaluate derivative uses, risks and controls for insurance investment portfolios.

• Derivative purposes: hedging duration, currency, equity and inflation exposures
• Interest-rate swaps: fixed-floating exchanges and hedge effectiveness considerations
• Futures and options used for efficient portfolio risk adjustments
• Foreign-exchange forwards for hedging overseas asset currency exposures
• Counterparty credit exposure, collateral terms and central clearing requirements
• Derivative mandate limits, documentation and independent valuation controls

Participants can decide when and how foreign-currency exposure should be hedged for an insurer.

• Home-currency liabilities and foreign-asset translation exposure
• Strategic currency hedging ratios based on liability and liquidity needs
• Forward points, carry costs and hedging programme performance
• Currency stress scenarios involving devaluation, volatility and capital controls
• Cross-border investment restrictions, tax considerations and repatriation risk
• Monitoring hedge effectiveness against approved currency-risk limits

Participants can explain how investment decisions affect insurer earnings, equity and reported performance.

• IFRS 17 measurement model and interaction with investment income
• Asset classification under IFRS 9: amortised cost, FVOCI and FVTPL
• Accounting mismatches between insurance liabilities and invested assets
• Other comprehensive income effects from bond valuation movements
• Realised and unrealised gains within insurer earnings analysis
• Performance reporting reconciled across economic, accounting and capital perspectives

Participants can assess how asset choices affect regulatory capital requirements and solvency resilience.

• Solvency II standard formula concepts for market and credit risk
• Own funds, solvency capital requirement and coverage-ratio interpretation
• Asset risk charges compared across bonds, equities, property and alternatives
• Diversification benefits and concentration-risk limits within capital calculations
• Look-through assessment for collective investment schemes and structured vehicles
• Capital-efficient portfolio adjustments without compromising liability matching

Participants can design risk monitoring and stress tests for an insurer investment portfolio.

• Investment risk taxonomy covering market, credit, liquidity and operational risks
• Value at Risk and expected shortfall for market-risk measurement
• Scenario analysis linking economic shocks to assets, liabilities and capital
• Reverse stress testing to identify solvency-breaking portfolio conditions
• Risk limits, early-warning indicators and breach escalation procedures
• Risk dashboards for investment committee and board risk committee reporting

Participants can select, mandate and monitor external managers against insurer requirements.

• Manager selection criteria: philosophy, team, process, capacity and controls
• Request-for-proposal scoring methods for specialist investment mandates
• Investment management agreements: objectives, restrictions, fees and reporting
• Benchmark design using liability-aware, market and peer-group reference points
• Performance attribution separating allocation, selection, currency and timing effects
• Manager review meetings, watchlists and termination decision criteria

Participants can establish governance arrangements that support accountable and ethical investment decisions.

• Investment policy statement sections, approval routes and review frequency
• Three-lines model applied to investment decision-making and oversight
• Conflicts of interest involving brokers, managers, issuers and personal dealing
• Stewardship responsibilities: voting, engagement and escalation with investee companies
• Responsible investment screens, exclusions and financially material ESG factors
• Audit trails for investment decisions, valuations and policy exceptions

Participants can build, review and present a complete insurer investment strategy, policy and monitoring pack.

• Define liability profile, investment objectives and approved risk appetite
• Set strategic allocation targets, ranges and rebalancing governance
• Construct matching, return-seeking and liquidity portfolio sleeves
• Assess capital, accounting, currency and derivative implications
• Specify limits, stress tests, reporting metrics and escalation actions
• Present board recommendation with assumptions, trade-offs and implementation priorities