In terms of natural catastrophe risk, ensuring capital adequacy and managing an effective risk management framework under Solvency II, requires the use of an internal model and the implementation of sophisticated nat cat models into the process. But what are the benefits of using an internal model and how can integrated cat models help a (re)insurer assess cat risk under the new regulatory regime?
Internal Model Versus the Standard Formula
Under Pillar I of the Directive, insurers are required to calculate their Solvency Capital Requirement (SCR), which is used to demonstrate to supervisors, policyholders, and shareholders that they have an adequate level of financial resources to absorb significant losses.
Companies have a choice between using the Standard Formula or an internal model (or partial internal model) when calculating their SCR, with many favoring the use of internal models, despite requiring significant resources and regulatory approval. Internal models are more risk-sensitive and can closely capture the true risk profile of a business by taking risks into account that are not always appropriately covered by the Standard Formula, therefore resulting in reduced capital requirements.
Catastrophe Risk is a Key Driver for Capital Under Solvency II
Rising insured losses from global natural catastrophes, driven by factors such as economic growth, increasing property values, rising population density, and insurance penetration—often in high risk regions, all demonstrate the value of embedding a cat model into the internal model process.
Due to significant variances in data granularity between the Standard Formula and an internal model, a magnitude of difference can exist between the two approaches when calculating solvency capital, with potentially lower SCR calculations for the cat component when using an internal model.
The application of Solvency II is, however, not all about capital estimation, but also relates to effective risk management processes embedded throughout an organization. Implementing cat models fully into the internal model process, as opposed to just relying only on cat model loss output, can introduce significant improvements to risk management processes. Cat models provide an opportunity to improve exposure data quality and allow model users to fully understand the benefits of complex risk mitigation structures and diversification. By providing a better reflection of a company’s risk profile, this can help reveal a company’s potential exposure to cat risk and support companies in making better governance and strategic management decisions.
Managing Cat Risk Using Cat Models
A challenging aspect of bringing cat models in-house and integrating them into the internal model process is the selection of the ”right” model and the “right” method to evaluate a company’s cat exposure. Catastrophe model vendors are therefore obliged to help users understand underlying assumptions and their inherent uncertainties, and provide them with the means of justifying model selection and appropriateness.
Insurers have benefited from RMS support to fulfil these requirements, offering model users deep insight into the underlying data, assumptions, and model validation, to ensure they have complete confidence in model strengths and limitations. With the knowledge that RMS provides, insurers can understand, take ownership, and implement a company’s own view of risk, and then demonstrate this to make more informed strategic decisions as required by the Own Risk and Solvency Assessment (ORSA), which lies at the heart of Solvency II.
