Contact: Diane Portantiere
(212) 346-5562
Date: November 2, 2004

Reinsurance, Workers Compensation and Reserve Adequacy among
Topics at CAS Annual Meeting, Nov. 14-17 in Montreal

ARLINGTON, VA -- Reinsurance coverage availability, trends in workers compensation in California and other notable jurisdictions, and the relationship between reserve adequacy and the underwriting cycle will be featured topics during the Annual Meeting of the Casualty Actuarial Society (CAS), November 14-17, 2004 at The Fairmont Queen Elizabeth hotel in Montreal, Quebec.

The meeting provides a forum for actuaries and other professionals to stay abreast of current issues affecting the insurance industry and the actuarial profession, as well as opportunities to interact with other actuaries from around the globe.

A day of joint activities on November 17, hosted by the CAS and the Canadian Institute of Actuaries (CIA), highlights the meeting program. The general session "Actuaries and Actuarial Issues Around the World" will feature a distinguished panel of leaders of international actuarial organizations presenting their views on key questions facing the actuarial profession.

The featured speaker is John Krubski, a commentator on the art and science of persuasion. Krubski is currently the chairman of the International Thought Leadership Council and the author of Who Dances First Naked Gets to Lead. He has built an international reputation for recognizing the unforeseen impacts of marketplace trends and helping organizations create a long-term vision that guides innovation.

Four general sessions are planned:

• Reinsurance Worldwide will address the current drivers of the reinsurance market, ever more sophisticated catastrophe modeling techniques, financial and underwriting risk analytics and emerging liability theories.

• Workers Compensation Update will feature a panel of experts who will provide presentations on the premium, loss cost and legislative trends in California and other notable jurisdictions, and will engage in a roundtable discussion about common areas of concern across jurisdictions.

• Reserve Adequacy and the Underwriting Cycle will feature a panel of experts and their views on the relationship between financial reserve adequacy and the underwriting cycle. Panelists will comment on trends and recent and pending legislation that may affect this issue in the future. They will also discuss how this issue affects outside rating agencies' views of both individual companies and the insurance market in general.

• Actuaries and Actuarial Issues Around the World will feature a panel of leaders of international actuarial organizations who will speak from the experiences in their own countries and offer a global perspective on the actuarial profession.

• asbestos liability
• auto insurance reforms in Canada
• captives
• emerging issues in medical malpractice
• enterprise risk management
• fair value accounting
• identity theft
• loss reserving
• professionalism standards
• Sarbanes-Oxley
• the insurance market and actuarial profession in Japan
• plagues of the 21st century
• actuaries in nontraditional roles

The registration fee is $725 for active members, candidates, affiliates or subscribers of the CAS or of an actuarial organization worldwide. Click here to view the complete brochure including registration options.

Members of the press are welcome to attend the meeting and are asked to register with Mike Boa, CAS manager, communications and research, at 703-276-3100 in advance of the meeting.

The Casualty Actuarial Society is an organization dedicated to the advancement of the body of knowledge of actuarial science applied to property, casualty and similar risk exposures. The primary goal of the Casualty Actuarial Society is to provide education and research to help its members become leading experts in the evaluation of hazard risk and the integration of hazard risk with strategic, financial and operational risk.