Vice President, L&A Transaction Risk

The Vice President, Life & Annuity Transaction Risk is a key leadership role responsible for overseeing new life insurance and annuity reinsurance transactions. Reporting directly to the SVP Life & Annuity Risk Officer, the VP Life & Annuity Transaction Risk will play a pivotal role reviewing all facets of new transactions, including but not limited to pricing assumptions, proposed investment and hedge strategies, deal risks and mitigants, pricing model accuracy and testing, and key contractual terms.

This position requires a strong financial / technical foundation in actuarial pricing of life insurance and annuity products, including ALM experience. Furthermore, it demands advanced leadership skills such collaboration, strategic thinking, situational agility, including the ability to effectively communicate with and influence both business unit peers and senior executive stakeholders.

What You Will Do:

Risk Strategy & Leadership

• Lead the development, implementation, and maintenance of a comprehensive transactional risk management framework.

• Serve as a trusted advisor to the SVP - ERM L&A Risk Officer, CRO, and other executive leadership on transactional risk-related matters in transaction working group and executive committee forums.

• Represent the SVP - ERM L&A Risk Officer as needed in committee meetings, client discussions, or other forums where transaction risk management strategies are discussed, and decisions are made.

• Monitor industry experience, risk management practices, and actuarial standards of practice, regularly advising the ERM and BU teams on trends and best practices.

Transaction Governance

• Monitor compliance with the company’s transaction governance and pricing standards; serve as a key advisor to BUs on compliance requirements.

• Periodically review transaction governance, updating standards, procedures, and guidelines as necessary to maintain a strong framework.

• Produce presentation slides or other materials to support transaction approval requirements by internal committees, the CEO, or the Board.

• Develop training materials and practice guides to regularly inform stakeholders on governance requirements.

Transaction Risk Assessment

• Perform risk assessments for all reinsurance transactions (acceptance and retrocession), acquisitions, divestitures, and other high-impact transactions.

• Evaluate the diligence plans supporting new transactions, including assumption underwriting, pricing, asset allocation and ALM strategy, operational, reputational, and compliance-related risks.

• Partner with business unit SMEs during the transaction underwriting and pricing process to ensure a thorough evaluation of all risks is performed.

• Review and approve the appraisal model testing plan in accordance with the company’s model governance standards. Conduct independent testing, model validation, or other due diligence as needed to quantify risks or to confirm the appropriateness of pricing results.

• Review contracts to ensure terms and conditions support the company’s operational and risk management objectives.

• Identify and recommend risk mitigation opportunities and strategies to minimize exposure in all phases of transactions.

• Write and/or peer review ERM memorandums to document transaction risks, functional due diligence, or other items as required for internal and regulatory approvals.

Risk Monitoring & Reporting

• Develop and/or review key performance indicators (KPIs), key risk indicators (KRIs), or other metrics that measure pricing outcomes and risks, benchmark them, and ensure effective mitigation.

• Recommend pricing sensitivity and scenario stress tests to quantify tail risks and/or the potential range of transaction return outcomes.

• Provide transaction risk reporting and guidance to internal committees, ERM leadership, and relevant stakeholders.

• Ensure that the risk appetite for all transactional activities aligns with the broader corporate risk management strategy and defined risk limits.

• Inform other members of the ERM team about new transactions to facilitate effective integration after transaction execution.

Stakeholder Collaboration

• Collaborate with internal departments such as actuarial, investments, legal, finance, and operations to ensure alignment on transactional risk management approach.

• Serve as a trusted advisor to BUs on risk and governance matters during all phases of a transaction.

• Represent ERM in discussions and negotiations with external parties to address risk concerns in transactions.

Regulatory Compliance

• Stay abreast of evolving insurance regulatory requirements, particularly in the US and Bermuda. Ensure that transactions and underlying deal assumptions comply with relevant regulations.

• Support development and review of filings or other materials submitted as part of the regulatory approval process.

Team Leadership & Development

• Lead a team of 2-3 transaction risk professionals, providing strategic direction, mentorship, and career development opportunities.

• Foster a culture of risk awareness and proactive risk management across the organization.

What You Will Have:

• Bachelor’s or advanced degree in Actuarial Science, Data Science, Mathematics, Financial Engineering, or another analytical field of study.

• Fellow of the Society of Actuaries (FSA) with a minimum 15 years of experience and progressively increasing responsibility.

• Significant knowledge of life insurance, annuities, and retirement products, including common benefit riders and secondary guarantees.

• Diverse experience in pricing and managing life insurance and annuity products.

• Applied insurance ALM experience, including understanding of diverse assets commonly used in insurance investment strategies and their associated risks

• Understanding of regulatory capital requirements and economic capital principles.

• Experience with development, use, and risk management of complex actuarial models in commercial actuarial software packages (e.g. AXIS, ALFA, etc).

• Experience with programming languages and other software commonly used in actuarial practice, such as…

  • Microsoft Office (e.g. Excel, Word, and PowerPoint),

  • Programming / database languages (e.g. Python, C++, VBA, SQL, R, or SAS).

• Demonstrated success working and collaborating cross-functionally across various departments and levels of the organization. 

• Proven leadership experience with the ability to effectively manage and develop a team.

• Excellent communication and presentation skills, with the ability to engage leadership.

In addition, strong candidates will meet some or all of the following requirements:

• Applied experience with both US Statutory and Economic Balance Sheet principles (e.g. the BMA solvency framework or IFRS / Solvency II).

• Experience with reinsurance structuring solutions and collateralization.

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