Every year since 1996, SCOR has rewarded the best academic work in the field of actuarial science with annual prizes in several countries throughout the world. 

These prizes are designed to promote the development of actuarial science, to encourage research in this field, and to contribute to the improvement of risk knowledge and management. The SCOR Actuarial Awards are recognized in the insurance and reinsurance industries as a mark of excellence. The Actuarial Awards in France are supported by the SCOR Corporate Foundation for Science, chaired by André Lévy-Lang.

The SCOR Actuarial Awards juries are composed of internationally recognized researchers and insurance, reinsurance and finance professionals. The winners are selected for their command of actuarial concepts, the quality of their analytical methods, and the originality of their research in terms of scientific advances and potential practical applications to the world of risk management.

In 2022, SCOR presented Actuarial Awards in five countries: Germany, France, Italy, Sweden and Switzerland.

If you are a student and would like to submit your thesis for the 2023 Actuarial Awards, please visit www.scor.com/en/actuarial-awards to learn more. The theme of the actuarial conference due to be held in France in December 2023 will be biodiversity risk. 

Denis Kessler, Chairman of SCOR, comments: “Recognized for their level of excellence, the SCOR Actuarial Awards have been rewarding innovative scientific work by young actuaries from around the world for more than 25 years. SCOR and its Corporate Foundation for Science are proud to promote the emergence and recognition of actuarial talent with these awards, which support new thinking on risk analysis and management and reflect the Group’s long-term commitment to research and the development of knowledge.”

Laurent Rousseau, Chief Executive Officer of SCOR, comments: “Reinsurers, as expert risk practitioners, rely on the art and science of risk to push back the frontiers of insurability and protect society. Today, faced with the new scale of threats, the challenge for reinsurers is to innovate in order to better anticipate, and to promote risk culture to as wide an audience as possible. SCOR is proud to develop and encourage research in the field of actuarial science, and to help improve risk knowledge and management through its SCOR Actuarial Awards.”

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SCOR Actuarial Award Winners 2022

On October 7 in Zurich, Fabian Uffer, SCOR Chief Risk Officer, presented the Actuarial Award for Switzerland. The prize went to Léonard Vincent of the University of Lausanne for his doctoral thesis “Model Uncertainty, Tail Risk and Structured Reinsurance”.

On October 14 in Stockholm, Svein Børre Solvang, CEO of SCOR Sweden Re, Frieder Knüpling, CEO of SCOR Life & Health, and Rasmus Thunberg, representing the Swedish Actuarial Association, presented the Actuarial Award for Sweden during the annual SCOR Sweden Re Life Insurance Conference. The 2022 prize was awarded to Lina Palmborg of Stockholm University, for her dissertation “Financial Position and Performance in IFRS 17”.

On December 13 in Paris, Denis Kessler, Chairman of SCOR, presented the 2022 Actuarial Awards for France, in conjunction with the French Institute of Actuaries and in the presence of its president, Laurence Bauduin. François Hu, of the Ecole nationale de la Statistique et de l’administration économique (ENSAE), received the Prix des Jeunes Docteurs for his thesis “ Semi-supervised Learning in Insurance: Fairness and Active Learning.” The Prix des Jeunes Actuaires was awarded to Stella Jovet of the Conservatoire national des arts et métiers (CNAM) for her dissertation “Optimisation de la rentabilité de risques catastrophes naturelles à l’aide d’un algorithme génétique : application à un portefeuille ouragan mexicain” (Optimizing the profitability of natural catastrophe risks using a genetic algorithm: application to a Mexican hurricane portfolio).

On December 14 in Milan, Umberto Gavazzi, Deputy CEO of Reinsurance at SCOR P&C, and president of the jury Professor Nino Savelli, of Milan’s Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, presented the 2022 Actuarial Awards for Italy. The awards went to Gabriele Omari of the University of Trieste, for his thesis “Tariffazione equa di portafogli di contratti di assicurazione sulla vita con partecipazione agli utili” (Fair pricing of profit-sharing life insurance contract portfolios), and Andrea Santoro of Sapienza University of Rome, for his thesis “Sulla stima delle frequenze di riscatto: evoluzioni metodologiche per l’analisi del Dynamic PolicyHolder Behavior” (On the estimation of surrender frequencies: methodological evolutions for Dynamic PolicyHolder Behavior analysis).

On December 15 in Cologne, Frieder Knüpling, CEO of SCOR Life & Health, presented the Actuarial Awards for Germany. The 2022 winners were Mark Kiermayer of the University of Ulm, for his thesis “Machine and Deep Learning in Present Actuarial Challenges”, Simon Schnürch of TU Kaiserslautern, for his thesis “Mortality Modeling: Machine Learning and Mortality Shocks”, and Arne Freimann of the University of Ulm for his thesis “Pricing, Hedging, and the Roles of Different Market Players in the Longevity Risk Transfer Market”. 

The award-winning papers can be accessed from the Actuarial Awards page:  https://www.scor.com/en/actuarial-awards

More SCOR Actuarial Awards will be presented again next year. The juries strongly encourage researchers and doctoral students to submit their work for these awards in 2023.