CAA Fellow Actuary (China) study guide
CAA Fellow Actuary (China) · Work through your exam, one topic at a time.
The CAA Fellow Actuary (正精算师) is the advanced professional credential awarded by the China Association of Actuaries (中国精算师协会). It signals that a candidate can sign off on and take responsibility for actuarial work across the Chinese insurance market, and it is typically pursued by actuaries already working in life, health, non-life, pension or risk roles who want the highest domestic qualification. The CAA Fellow Actuary (China) study guide has 9 sections and about 4,056 words.
01Actuarial Mathematics and Risk Theory
Actuarial Mathematics and Risk Theory is the quantitative backbone of the CAA Fellow syllabus. The exam tests whether you can move fluently between life-table notation, multiple-state models and aggregate-loss theory, and whether you can justify the assumptions behind each formula rather than simply compute.
513 words, about 3 min02Life Insurance and Health Insurance Actuarial Practice
This domain covers how Chinese life and health insurers price, reserve and report business. The exam probes the mechanics of the pricing bases (预定利率、预定发生率、预定费用率), three-source profit attribution, product rules for 分红险、万能险 and 投连险, and the regulatory constraints shaping health products - especially 重大疾病保险 and short-term medical business.
453 words, about 2 min03Non-life Insurance Actuarial Practice
Non-life practice in the CAA syllabus spans pricing, reserving and portfolio management for Chinese property and casualty insurers, with heavy emphasis on motor business after the 2020 comprehensive reform and on claim-reserve estimation. Expect questions that hand you a development triangle, a loss ratio and an earned premium, then ask for an ultimate loss and an IBNR with the method justified.
427 words, about 2 min04Pension and Social Insurance
This domain examines China's multi-pillar retirement system and the actuarial techniques used to cost and value retirement promises. The exam tests the institutional detail of 基本养老保险, 企业年金/职业年金 and 个人养老金, alongside the standard costing methods (accrued benefit, projected unit credit, entry age normal) and the assumptions that drive liability measurement.
454 words, about 2 min05Investment and Asset-Liability Management
This domain tests how insurers match long-dated, interest-sensitive liabilities against market assets under Chinese solvency and investment rules. Questions typically combine duration and convexity mechanics with the regulatory limits on asset classes and the economics of participating and universal-life accounts.
452 words, about 2 min06Financial Accounting and Reporting for Insurers
This domain covers how Chinese insurers report results, centring on the revised CAS 25 issued in December 2020 and convergent with IFRS 17, together with the supporting reports regulators and boards actually read: solvency reports, embedded value disclosures and the actuarial annual report. Effective dates: entities listed both domestically and overseas, or listed overseas using IFRS or ASBE, from 1 January 2023; other domestic listed companies from 1 January 2024; non-listed companies from 1 January 2026.
417 words, about 2 min07Insurance Law, Regulation and Professional Ethics
This domain tests the legal rules that decide claims and the regulatory and ethical framework in which actuaries sign their names. Expect fact patterns - a non-disclosure, a disputed exclusion clause, a late claim decision - and questions asking which statutory clock or doctrine governs.
475 words, about 2 min08Enterprise Risk Management and Capital Management
This domain covers the Chinese risk-based capital regime and the ERM machinery that feeds it. Questions test the arithmetic of minimum capital aggregation, the three-pillar architecture of 偿二代, the qualitative requirements that adjust capital, and the governance structures - risk appetite, stress testing, ORSA - that regulators expect to see operating.
422 words, about 2 min09Actuarial Modeling, Data Analysis and Communication
The final domain tests whether you can build, validate and explain a model rather than only run one. The exam combines model governance, data quality, statistical technique and - often underweighted by candidates - the ability to communicate uncertainty to a board or a regulator in plain terms.
443 words, about 2 min