Phil Tervit and Simon Richards, joint chairs, outline the Risk and Investment Conference 2015
In June, the IFoA annual Risk and Investment Conference will take place at The Celtic Manor Resort in Wales. The reputation of the conference continues to grow and we are delighted to announce a programme of speakers that will attract actuaries and non-actuaries from the full spectrum of practice areas. Delegates can expect to engage in thought-provoking content from their own areas of expertise while enjoying the opportunity to learn more about the application of core actuarial techniques to related areas.
This year, we are exploring a theme of 'New Frontiers', recognising both the significant political and regulatory change that is taking place across the core areas of interest for actuaries while also acknowledging the growing involvement of actuaries in wider fields such as banking and the environment.
We have been able to source a variety of renowned speakers to deliver presentations that align with our key conference theme. Those who attended in 2014 will be pleased to hear that economist Professor Richard Werner will again be speaking, having received outstanding feedback from the 2014 conference for his exploration of 'The Money Game'. The conference timing is such that the recent go-live date for 'Freedom and Choice in Pensions' will be highly topical, and a panel discussion of key industry and regulatory experts is lined up to discuss the initial reactions to those changes.
Our other plenary sessions incorporate risk and investment themes in the context of:
? the current market environment and the outlook for interest rates;
? the problems of communicating risk and uncertainty;
? stranded assets and sustainability.
To allow us to better tailor the sessions to the differing needs of the delegates, we have been able to incorporate some split plenary sessions, allowing participants to choose between risk-focused or investment-focused sessions.
We are also including a variety of 'beginner' presentations to encourage actuaries to broaden their areas of knowledge and facilitate cross-fertilisation of ideas between actuaries from different disciplines.
We are delighted to have mountaineer Joe Simpson (left), author of Touching the Void, open the event with his truly remarkable life experiences. He will be followed by Ben Goldacre (above), author of Bad Science, giving his view on modern use of data and statistics.
Alongside the technical continuing professional development (CPD), there will be plenty of time for networking, plus the chance to obtain one hour of professional skills CPD.
We look forward to welcoming you to the conference in June.
