SAS an actuarial modeling and financial planning systems leader, says Chartis

Report highlights elevated insurance risk offerings with powerful asset-liability management capabilities

As inflation and interest rates surge alongside evolving regulation, analytics offer a compass for regulators, (re)insurers and their clients navigating nebulous outlooks. Amidst turbulent market conditions, independent research firm Chartis declared analytics giant SAS a RiskTech Quadrant^® Leader in three categories for actuarial modeling and financial planning systems:

• Asset and liability management.
• Risk and capital management.
• Financial planning and analysis.

The newly published Vendor Analysis is based on the Chartis quadrant report Actuarial Modeling and Financial Planning Systems, 2022: Market and Vendor Landscape, published in September.

"SAS’ acquisition of Kamakura last year signaled a new chapter of innovation for SAS – just as asset liability management is becoming a focal point across financial services," said Sidhartha Dash, Chief Researcher at Chartis. "SAS' comprehensive portfolio of industry-focused solutions on cloud-native SAS^® Viya^® enables insurers to more accurately model and predict cashflows, helping to foster more financial certainty."

Proactive planning, powerful analytics, pliable modeling

Demand is accelerating for robust asset liability management capabilities in the face of prolonged economic instability and conundrums like climate change. Both present challenging conditions that are difficult to maneuver or predict.

Flexible actuarial modeling, taking full advantage of sophisticated machine-learning techniques, and strong predictive analytics capabilities are critical to accurately creating finely tuned pricing and premium models and ensuring insurers’ financial solvency. This puts SAS squarely in Leader territory in these categories based on Chartis’ evaluation of four SAS insurance solutions:

• SAS Financial Planning. The Chartis Vendor Analysis notes, “SAS’ flexible and scalable architecture can handle a variety of different data types, giving it a considerable advantage over other offerings.”
• SAS Insurance Capital Management. According to Chartis, “In addition to its pre-existing risk and capital modeling functionality, SAS’ experience in risk-based solvency modeling is a principal reason why the company is a category leader in risk and capital management. The ability to leverage subject-matter experts and the company’s ongoing investment in its cloud offering makes SAS’ solution very competitive.”
• SAS Asset and Liability Management. Per Chartis, “SAS Asset Liability Management allows clients to plan and manage their balance sheets proactively, offering a rich set of scenario-based analytics on the static or projected balance sheet over a range of business, economic and market assumptions.”
• SAS Dynamic Actuarial Modeling. The Vendor Analysis highlights the solution’s ability to “enable a guided and governed actuarial process, from data preparation and modeling to automatic deployment and organization-wide integrated reporting” while delivering “real-time quotations based on customizable model parameters and decision factors.”

Kamakura acquisition elevates SAS’ risk solutions

SAS’ June 2022 acquisition of Kamakura Corporation drew Chartis’ attention. The melding of Kamakura’s decades of risk management expertise and renowned risk offerings, particularly in the realm of asset liability management (ALM), with SAS’ powerful analytics and modeling abilities beckons paradigm-changing risk management advances. 

“SAS’ compliance-related experience has been enhanced by its recent acquisition of Kamakura,” Chartis says, “giving the company a significant overall advantage as more jurisdictions adopt risk-based capital regimes. With its recent acquisition of Kamakura, SAS is well-placed to leverage that company’s robust ALM capabilities, alongside its own experience, to enhance SAS Viya and develop a combined offering to cover the entire balance sheet.”

“This year’s sweeping premium increases to shore up capital and liquidity in the wake of supply chain disruption, inflation and catastrophic storms, can make competing feel challenging in a customer-centric insurance market,” said Troy Haines, Senior Vice President and Head of Risk Research and Quantitative Solutions at SAS. “Powerful and precise analytics empower insurers to navigate the market judiciously, adhere to regulatory requirements and best practices and, critically, promote solvency amid turbulent economic conditions.”

Visit SAS.com/insurance to learn how SAS analytics can empower data-driven decisioning to mitigate risk, detect and prevent fraud, and better serve customers across the insurance industry.

About Chartis Research

Chartis Research is the leading provider of research and analysis on the global market for risk technology. It is part of Infopro Digital, which owns market-leading brands such as Risk and WatersTechnology. Chartis' goal is to support enterprises as they drive business performance through improved risk management, corporate governance and compliance, and to help clients make informed technology and business decisions by providing in-depth analysis and actionable advice on virtually all aspects of risk technology.