Appointed actuaries are responsible for estimating the largest liability on property–casualty
insurance companies' balance sheet. Actuarial independence is crucial in safeguarding …

Loss reserves are a discretionary tool for managing insurer earnings, with more accurate
and/or less volatile reserve errors resulting in higher accruals quality. We investigate …

Managerial, or discretionary, earnings opacity is the intentional lack of transparency to hide
the intrinsic value of a firm. Opacity arises through two channels. The first is ex ante, when …

Mutual insurance companies represent a large and important segment of the insurance
industry. They account for just under half of the total US property/casualty (PC) insurance …