Upper bound for ruin probabilities under optimal investment and proportional reinsurance

In this paper, we consider the optimal investment and reinsurance from an insurer's point of view to maximize the adjustment coefficient. We obtain the explicit expressions for the optimal results in the diffusion approximation (D‐A) case as well as in the jump‐diffusion (J‐D) case. Furthermore, we derive a sharper bound on the ruin probability, from which we conclude that the case with investment is always better than the case without investment. Some numerical examples are presented to show that the ruin probability in the D‐A case sometimes underestimates the ruin probability in the J‐D case. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

On optimal proportional reinsurance and investment in a Markovian regime-switching economy

In this paper, the surplus of an insurance company is modeled by a Markovian regimeswitching diffusion process. The insurer decides the proportional reinsurance and investment so as to increase revenue. The regime-switching economy consists of a fixed interest security and several risky shares. The optimal proportional reinsurance and investment strategies with no short-selling constraints for maximizing an exponential utility on terminal wealth are obtained.     

On optimal proportional reinsurance and investment in a hidden Markov financial market

This paper investigates the optimal reinsurance and investment in a hidden Markov financial market consisting of non-risky (bond) and risky (stock) asset. We assume that only the price of the risky asset can be observed from the financial market. Suppose that the insurance company can adopt proportional reinsurance and investment in the hidden Markov financial market to reduce risk or increase profit. Our objective is to maximize the expected exponential utility of the terminal wealth of the surplus of the insurance company. By using the filtering theory, we establish the separation principle and reduce the problem to the complete information case. With the help of Girsanov change of measure and the dynamic programming approach, we characterize the value function as the unique solution of a linear parabolic partial differential equation and obtain the Feynman-Kac representation of the value function.     

Optimal proportional reinsurance and investment for stochastic factor models

In this work we investigate the optimal proportional reinsurance-investment strategy of an insurance company which wishes to maximize the expected exponential utility of its terminal wealth in a finite time horizon. Our goal is to extend the classical Cramér–Lundberg model introducing a stochastic factor which affects the intensity of the claims arrival process, described by a Cox process, as well as the insurance and reinsurance premia. The financial market is supposed not influenced by the stochastic factor, hence it is independent on the insurance market. Using the classical stochastic control approach based on the Hamilton–Jacobi–Bellman equation we characterize the optimal strategy and provide a verification result for the value function via classical solutions to two backward partial differential equations. Existence and uniqueness of these solutions are discussed. Results under various premium calculation principles are illustrated and a new premium calculation rule is proposed in order to get more realistic strategies and to better fit our stochastic factor model. Finally, numerical simulations are performed to obtain sensitivity analyses.     

Risk-based optimal investment and proportional reinsurance of an insurer with hidden regime switching

In this paper, we study the optimal investment and proportional reinsurance strategy for an insurer in a hidden Markov regime-switching environment. A risk-based approach is considered, where the insurer aims at selecting an optimal strategy with a view to minimizing the risk described by a convex risk measure of its terminal wealth. We solve the problem in two steps. First, we employ the filtering theory to turn the optimization problem with partial observations into one with complete observations. Second, by using BSDEs with jumps, we solve the problem with complete observations.     

Optimal proportional reinsurance and investment under partial information

In this paper, we study the optimal proportional reinsurance and investment strategy for an insurer that only has partial information at its disposal, under the criterion of maximizing the expected utility of the terminal wealth. We assume that the surplus of the insurer is governed by a jump diffusion process, and that reinsurance is used by the insurer to reduce risk. In addition, the insurer can invest in financial markets. We give a characterization for the optimal strategy within a non-Markovian setting. Malliavin calculus for Lévy processes is used for the analysis.     

Optimal proportional reinsurance and investment based on Hamilton-Jacobi-Bellman equation

In the whole paper, the claim process is assumed to follow a Brownian motion with drift and the insurer is allowed to invest in a risk-free asset and a risky asset. In addition, the insurer can purchase the proportional reinsurance to reduce the risk. The paper concerns the optimal problem of maximizing the utility of terminal wealth. By solving the corresponding Hamilton-Jacobi-Bellman equations, the optimal strategies about how to purchase the proportional reinsurance and how to invest in the risk-free asset and risky asset are derived respectively.     

Constant elasticity of variance model for proportional reinsurance and investment strategies

In our model, the insurer is allowed to buy reinsurance and invest in a risk-free asset and a risky asset. The claim process is assumed to follow a Brownian motion with drift, while the price process of the risky asset is described by the constant elasticity of variance (CEV) model. The Hamilton-Jacobi-Bellman (HJB) equation associated with the optimal reinsurance and investment strategies is established, and solutions are found for insurers with CRRA or CARRA utility.     

Optimal investment,consumption and proportional reinsurance under model uncertainty

This paper considers the optimal investment, consumption and proportional reinsurance strategies for an insurer under model uncertainty. The surplus process of the insurer before investment and consumption is assumed to be a general jump–diffusion process. The financial market consists of one risk-free asset and one risky asset whose price process is also a general jump–diffusion process. We transform the problem equivalently into a two-person zero-sum forward–backward stochastic differential game driven by two-dimensional Lévy noises. The maximum principles for a general form of this game are established to solve our problem. Some special interesting cases are studied by using Malliavin calculus so as to give explicit expressions of the optimal strategies.     

Optimal proportional reinsurance and investment with minimum probability of ruin

The paper concerns a problem of optimal reinsurance and investment in order to minimizing the probability of ruin. In the whole paper, the cedent’s surplus is allowed to invest in a risk-free asset and a risky asset and the company’s risk is reduced through proportional reinsurance, while in addition the claim process is assumed to follow a Brownian motion with drift. By solving the corresponding Hamilton-Jacobi-Bellman equations, the optimal reinsurance-investment strategy is derived. The presented results generalize those by Taksar [1].     

Optimal proportional reinsurance and investment with multiple risky assets and no-shorting constraint

In this paper, the basic claim process is assumed to follow a Brownian motion with drift. In addition, the insurer is allowed to invest in a risk-free asset and n risky assets and to purchase proportional reinsurance. Under the constraint of no-shorting, we consider two optimization problems: the problem of maximizing the expected exponential utility of terminal wealth and the problem of minimizing the probability of ruin. By solving the corresponding Hamilton–Jacobi–Bellman equations, explicit expressions for their optimal value functions and the corresponding optimal strategies are obtained. In particular, when there is no risk-free interest rate, the results indicate that the optimal strategies, under maximizing the expected exponential utility and minimizing the probability of ruin, are equivalent for some special parameter. This validates Ferguson’s longstanding conjecture about the relation between the two problems.     

Optimal proportional reinsurance and investment in a stock market with Ornstein-Uhlenbeck process

In this paper, we study the optimal investment and proportional reinsurance strategy when an insurance company wishes to maximize the expected exponential utility of the terminal wealth. It is assumed that the instantaneous rate of investment return follows an Ornstein-Uhlenbeck process. Using stochastic control theory and Hamilton-Jacobi-Bellman equations, explicit expressions for the optimal strategy and value function are derived not only for the compound Poisson risk model but also for the Brownian motion risk model. Further, we investigate the partially observable optimization problem, and also obtain explicit expressions for the optimal results.     

Robust optimal reinsurance and investment strategies for an AAI with multiple risks

This paper studies the robust optimal reinsurance and investment problem for an ambiguity averse insurer (abbr. AAI). The AAI sells insurance contracts and has access to proportional reinsurance business. The AAI can invest in a financial market consisting of four assets: one risk-free asset, one bond, one inflation protected bond and one stock, and has different levels of ambiguity aversions towards the risks. The goal of the AAI is to seek the robust optimal reinsurance and investment strategies under the worst case scenario. Here, the nominal interest rate is characterized by the Vasicek model; the inflation index is introduced according to the Fisher’s equation; and the stock price is driven by the Heston’s stochastic volatility model. The explicit forms of the robust optimal strategies and value function are derived by introducing an auxiliary robust optimal control problem and stochastic dynamic programming method. In the end of this paper, a detailed sensitivity analysis is presented to show the effects of market parameters on the robust optimal reinsurance policy, the robust optimal investment strategy and the utility loss when ignoring ambiguity.     

Optimal investment,consumption and proportional reinsurance for an insurer with option type payoff

This paper is devoted to the study of optimization of investment, consumption and proportional reinsurance for an insurer with option type payoff at the terminal time under the criterion of exponential utility maximization. The surplus process of the insurer and the financial risky asset process are assumed to be diffusion processes driven by Brownian motions which are non-Markovian in general. Very general constraints are imposed on the investment and the proportional reinsurance processes. Based on the martingale optimization principle, we use BSDE and BMO martingale techniques to derive the optimal strategy and the optimal value function. Some interesting particular cases are studied in which the explicit expressions for the optimal strategy are given by using the Malliavin calculus.     

Robust optimal investment and reinsurance problem for a general insurance company under Heston model

In this paper, we study a robust optimal investment and reinsurance problem for a general insurance company which contains an insurer and a reinsurer. Assume that the claim process described by a Brownian motion with drift, the insurer can purchase proportional reinsurance from the reinsurer. Both the insurer and the reinsurer can invest in a financial market consisting of one risk-free asset and one risky asset whose price process is described by the Heston model. Besides, the general insurance company’s manager will search for a robust optimal investment and reinsurance strategy, since the general insurance company faces model uncertainty and its manager is ambiguity-averse in our assumption. The optimal decision is to maximize the minimal expected exponential utility of the weighted sum of the insurer’s and the reinsurer’s surplus processes. By using techniques of stochastic control theory, we give sufficient conditions under which the closed-form expressions for the robust optimal investment and reinsurance strategies and the corresponding value function are obtained.     

Optimal proportional reinsurance and investment with transaction costs, I: Maximizing the terminal wealth

We consider a problem of optimal reinsurance and investment with multiple risky assets for an insurance company whose surplus is governed by a linear diffusion. The insurance company’s risk can be reduced through reinsurance, while in addition the company invests its surplus in a financial market with one risk-free asset and n risky assets. In this paper, we consider the transaction costs when investing in the risky assets. Also, we use Conditional Value-at-Risk (CVaR) to control the whole risk. We consider the optimization problem of maximizing the expected exponential utility of terminal wealth and solve it by using the corresponding Hamilton-Jacobi-Bellman (HJB) equation. Explicit expression for the optimal value function and the corresponding optimal strategies are obtained.     

Optimal proportional reinsurance and investment problem with jump-diffusion risk process under effect of inside information

We study optimal investment and proportional reinsurance strategy in the presence of inside information. The risk process is assumed to follow a compound Poisson process perturbed by a standard Brownian motion. The insurer is allowed to invest in a risk-free asset and a risky asset as well as to purchase proportional reinsurance. In addition, it has some extra information available from the beginning of the trading interval, thus introducing in this way inside information aspects to our model. We consider two optimization problems： the problem of maximizing the expected exponential utility of terminal wealth with and without inside information, respectively. By solving the corresponding Hamilton-Jacobi-Bellman equations, explicit expressions for their optimal value functions and the corresponding optimal strategies are obtained. Finally, we discuss the effects of parameters on the optimal strategy and the effect of the inside information by numerical simulations.     

Optimal investment and reinsurance strategy

An insurance company is modelled by a compound Poisson process and it is assumed that the company has a possibility to purchase an excess of loss reinsurance defined by retention level as well as invest its surplus into a risky asset described by the Black-Scholes model. An optimal survival probability is derived as a solution to the corresponding Hamilton-Jacobi-Bellman equation. It is proved that any increasing solution to the Hamilton-Jacobi-Bellman equation defines the optimal strategy.     

Optimal impulse and regular control strategies for proportional reinsurance problem

We formulate a stochastic control problem on proportional reinsurance that includes impulse and regular control strategies. For the first time we combine impulse control with regular control, and derive the expected total discount pay-out (return function) from present to bankruptcy. By relying on both stochastic calculus and the classical theory of impulse and regular controls, we state a set of sufficient conditions for its solution in terms of optimal return function. Moreover, we also derive its explicit form and corresponding impulse and regular control strategies.