Pricing extreme mortality risk in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic

In pricing extreme mortality risk, it is commonly assumed that interest rate and mortality rate are independent. However, the COVID-19 pandemic calls this assumption into question. In this paper, we employ a bivariate affine jump-diffusion model to describe the joint dynamics of interest rate and excess mortality, allowing for both correlated diffusions and joint jumps. Utilizing the latest U.S. mortality and interest rate data, we find a significant negative correlation between interest rate and excess mortality, and a much higher jump intensity when the pandemic experience is considered. Moreover, we construct a risk-neutral pricing measure that accounts for both diffusion and jump risk premia, and we solve for the market prices of risk based on mortality bond prices. Our results show that the pandemic experience can drastically change investors' perception of the mortality risk market in the post-pandemic era. © 2022 Elsevier B.V.

Pricing Extreme Mortality Risk in the Wake of the COVID-19 Pandemic

In pricing extreme mortality risk, it is commonly assumed that interest rate and mortality rate are independent. However, the COVID-19 pandemic calls this assumption into question. In this paper, we employ a bivariate affine jump-diffusion model to describe the joint dynamics of interest rate and excess mortality, allowing for both correlated diffusions and joint jumps. Utilizing the latest U.S. mortality and interest rate data, we find a significant negative correlation between interest rate and excess mortality, and a much higher jump intensity when the pandemic experience is considered. Moreover, we construct a risk-neutral pricing measure that accounts for both diffusion and jump risk premia, and we solve for the market prices of risk based on mortality bond prices. Our results show that the pandemic experience can drastically change investors' perception of the mortality risk market in the post-pandemic era.

Modeling pandemic mortality risk and its application to mortality-linked security pricing.

To provide insights for how to deal with pandemic mortality risk, this article introduces a mortality model that depicts the relevant pandemic effects on pricing mortality-linked securities, using a threshold jump approach. That is, to capture pandemic mortality dynamics across countries, we consider mortality jumps related to the pandemic shock and to a specific country shock. Pandemic jump occurs only when a pandemic event causes significant deaths worldwide, such as 1918 Spanish flu or COVID-19. Then the proposed pandemic mortality model can be adjusted according to country-specific mortality experiences. We further analyze the effect of pandemic mortality risk on pricing a mortality-linked bond. Using the first Swiss Re mortality bond as an example, a further derivation obtains the closed-form solution for the fixed-coupon mortality-linked bond in the pandemic mortality framework. Finally, this study details the impacts of pandemic mortality risk numerically by fitting the model to the United States, England and Wales, France, Italy, and Switzerland and calculating the fair spread of the mortality-linked bond.