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rorror45
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which investment banks have strong expertise in insurance and pension fields?

May 13th, 2016, 12:41 am

?
 
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ISayMoo
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which investment banks have strong expertise in insurance and pension fields?

May 14th, 2016, 6:53 pm

None. Insurance and pensions are buyside, not sell side. They hate each other.
 
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bearish
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which investment banks have strong expertise in insurance and pension fields?

May 14th, 2016, 8:31 pm

QuoteOriginally posted by: ISayMooNone. Insurance and pensions are buyside, not sell side. They hate each other.Silly. All the investment banks will have "solutions groups" that specialize in serving the perceived needs of insurance companies and various kinds of pension funds (especially DB plans, at least in the US). Obvious suspects include JPM, GS and MS, but that is not based on much in the way of first hand knowledge. The question is also unnecessarily broad and terse.
 
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ISayMoo
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which investment banks have strong expertise in insurance and pension fields?

May 15th, 2016, 8:03 am

This is asset management, not pensions and insurance. Their clients happen to be pension and insurance companies, but that's not what the OP asked about, I believe.
 
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bearish
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which investment banks have strong expertise in insurance and pension fields?

May 15th, 2016, 10:27 am

QuoteOriginally posted by: ISayMooThis is asset management, not pensions and insurance. Their clients happen to be pension and insurance companies, but that's not what the OP asked about, I believe.The question was obviously not well posed. It is entirely possible that he was referring to what inside the industry is known as "investment banking", i.e. M&A and related corporate finance advisory services, in which case my answer would be much the same (i.e. the sort of places that were once were once referred to as bulge bracket). But this would clearly not be an optimal forum for that kind of question...
 
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rorror45
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which investment banks have strong expertise in insurance and pension fields?

May 15th, 2016, 11:41 am

hi,I am sorry. I meant groups like "asset management solutions" or "pension advisory group" within an investment bank. Obviously, Goldman would be one of them (their global portfolio solutions group). JP Morgan Asset Management likewise.Sorry for the confusion. I have another question.1) Which investment banks have asset management (AM) or pension advisory groups with strong reputation?2) Which buy-side AM firms (excluding those within investment banks) have strong reputation in pensions advisory?I am asking these questions because I am interested in both actuarial and investment fields, and think that liability driven investing (LDI) for pension plans is something that combines the two.Thank you.
 
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ArthurDent
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which investment banks have strong expertise in insurance and pension fields?

May 16th, 2016, 2:32 am

Strongest advisory in this area would be FIG at Goldman, Deutsche, JP both in Investment Banking and Wealth Management divisions.Since the crisis almost all the insurance firms have set up in house risk departments that directly work with the trading desks rather than going via advisory for ALM risk management.Also look at model advisors: Towers Watson, Milliman - both sell side and buy side use them quite a bit for independent third party advice.
 
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BramJ
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which investment banks have strong expertise in insurance and pension fields?

May 17th, 2016, 10:12 am

Are you interested in this because you are looking for a job, or because you have specific questions?
 
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dweeb
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which investment banks have strong expertise in insurance and pension fields?

May 17th, 2016, 1:31 pm

There is/was an IB business securitizing life policies.
 
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rorror45
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which investment banks have strong expertise in insurance and pension fields?

May 18th, 2016, 6:44 pm

I was/still am pursuing the actuarial field and have passed three exams so far. I recently came across liability driven investing, in which asset managers help pension funds using financial assets like bonds, equities, and derivatives. It appears that LDI is really the combination of actuarial and investment fields, which is what I really want to do. It appears that JPAM, GSAM, and Blackrock are top investment firms doing LDI. I guess my questions can be better phrased as:1) What investment firms besides JPAM, GSAM, and Blackrock have strong expertise in insurance, pension, and LDI advisory services?2) What kinds of educational background are often required to get that job? I remember there was a pension and insurance engineering "internship" opportunity at Societe Generale, but they were looking for someone with a "Ph.D", which makes it appear very difficult to get.3) What kinds of skills are needed to prepare well for LDI?4) Other advice?Just summarizing me, I have studied Math and Econ in undergraduate, but will study Operations Research (potentially minor in stat or applied math too) for next two years. I have also passed three actuarial exams (P, FM, and MFE) which excites me even more about the actuarial and investment fields.
 
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bearish
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which investment banks have strong expertise in insurance and pension fields?

May 18th, 2016, 7:37 pm

Not surprisingly, life insurance companies such as MetLife and Prudential do LDI business, including large pension risk transfer deals. Pimco has a pretty significant pension and insurance solutions group. This is also an area where the actuarial consultants play a pretty significant role.It should be noted that approaches to LDI tend to be strongly accounting driven/constrained, so you may want to look into this angle.
 
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Alan
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which investment banks have strong expertise in insurance and pension fields?

May 19th, 2016, 3:14 am

QuoteOriginally posted by: rorror454) Other advice?Go with Vanguard. They can talk the (LDI) talk and, in the end, 95% of institutional clients will be better off with a very low cost, passive approach.
 
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rorror45
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which investment banks have strong expertise in insurance and pension fields?

May 19th, 2016, 1:55 pm

You mean 95% of the institutional clients are better off not doing LDI? How can I find more information about it?
 
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Alan
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which investment banks have strong expertise in insurance and pension fields?

May 19th, 2016, 2:40 pm

Not at all. I just mean once broad investment policy choices are made, the actual allocations are probably best made to broad-based, lost-cost, passive indexes. The reality is that few investment managers are worth their fees and much of what they offer amounts to simply hand-holding. Efficient markets make for a strange dynamic. If you hire a plumber or an electrician, you will likely actually be hiring a skill-set above the proverbial man on the street. If you hire an investment manager, you are certainly gaining some above average knowledge about the markets,but very likely not some above average ability to beat the markets.
Last edited by Alan on May 18th, 2016, 10:00 pm, edited 1 time in total.
 
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rorror45
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which investment banks have strong expertise in insurance and pension fields?

May 19th, 2016, 2:52 pm

Not at all, meaning the benefit of doing LDI is less than the cost of investment managers fee, right?