Previous studies of financial health of insurance companies are mainly focused on insurers operating in the United States and developed economies. This article focuses on the solvency of general (property-liability) and life insurance companies in Asia using firm data and macro data separately. It uses different classification methods to classify the financial status of both general and life insurance companies. With the exception of Japan, failures of insurers in Singapore, Malaysia, and Taiwan are nonexistent. We find that, first, the factors that significantly affect general insurers' financial health in Asian economies are firm size, investment performance, liquidity ratio, surplus growth, combined ratio, and operating margin. Second, the factors that significantly affect life insurers' financial health are firm size, change in asset mix, investment performance, and change in product mix, but the last three factors are more applicable to Japan. Third, the financial health of insurance companies in Singapore seems to be significantly weakened by the Asian Financial Crisis. As the insurance industry in different Asian economies is at different stages of development, they require different regulatory guidelines. Copyright The Journal of Risk and Insurance.

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For over two decades there have been intense efforts aimed at the development of alternatives to conventional magnets, particularly materials comprised in part or wholly of molecular components. Such alternatives offer the prospect of realizing magnets fabricated through controlled, low-temperature, solution-based chemistry, as opposed to high-temperature metallurgical routes, and also the possibility of tuning magnetic properties through synthesis. However, examples of magnetically ordered molecular materials at or near room temperature are extremely rare, and the properties of these materials are often capricious and difficult to reproduce. Here we present a versatile solution-based route to a new class of metal-organic materials exhibiting magnetic order well above room temperature. Reactions of the metal (M) precursor complex bis(1,5-cyclooctadiene)nickel with three different organics A-TCNE (tetracyanoethylene), TCNQ (7,7,8,8-tetracyanoquinodimethane) or DDQ (2,3-dichloro-5,6-dicyano-1,4-benzoquinone)--proceed via electron transfer from nickel to A and lead to materials containing Ni(II) ions and reduced forms of A in a 2:1 Ni:A ratio--that is, opposite to that of conventional (low Curie temperature) MA(2)-type magnets. These materials also contain oxygen-based species within their architectures. Magnetic characterization of the three compounds reveals spontaneous field-dependent magnetization and hysteresis at room temperature, with ordering temperatures well above ambient. The unusual stoichiometry and striking magnetic properties highlight these three compounds as members of a class of stable magnets that are at the interface between conventional inorganic magnets and genuine molecule-based magnets.

FeS 2 and (Fe,Co)S 2 thin films prepared by magnetron sputtering have been investigated as model catalysts for the oxygen reduction reaction (ORR), and their activities were compared against that of a sputtered thin film of Pt. Scanning Auger microscopy (SAM), X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDX), X-ray diffraction (XRD), and micro-Raman spectroscopy have been used, in parallel with electrochemical activity measurements using the thin film as a rotating disk electrode (RDE), to assess how the electrochemical performances of the sulfide films relate to chemical composition and structure. Comparisons were also made against a mineral FeS 2 pyrite whose open circuit potential (OCP) was 0.62 V and much less than the values of 0.78 and 0.80 V found for the FeS 2 and (Fe,Co)S 2 thin films, respectively (all potentials are given vs the reversible hydrogen electrode). There are indications that the ORR activities for these films may be associated with the presence of some polysulfides in addition to the expected S 2 2bulk and surface sites.

Previous studies of life insurance demand mainly employ multivariate regression analysis to examine the social, economic and demographic effects on life insurance purchases. However, this causal modeling approach can not separate the age, period, and cohort effects completely. This study employs cohort analysis method as well as age standardization and decomposition to examine the life insurance purchase pattern in the U.S. from 1940 through 1996. It finds that, without the aging process, the purchase rate in 1990 and 1995 would have been even lower. It also finds that the baby boomers tend to purchase lesser life insurance than their earlier counterparts and that this phenomenon consequently led to the decline of recent life insurance purchases in the U.S. Men show a strong age effect and strong negative cohort effects while women have strong positive cohort effects.

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This study examines the presence and causes of the underwriting cycle in Asia. It also compares the characteristics of the underwriting cycle in emerging markets in Asia with its characteristics in developed markets. We found that, first, second-order autoregression results support the existence of the underwriting cycle in Asia. Second, the analysis of premium changes provides some support for the rational expectations/institutional intervention hypothesis. Third, although there is little evidence to prove that the stock markets and interest rates have caused the cycle in Asia, the results seem to indicate that the underwriting cycles in Asian countries are mainly related to the pace of the economic growth in those countries. Fourth, our results with respect to the factors affecting the changes in premiums generally differ from those found for the developed nations.

Using AFM/XRD/XPS methods, in this paper, we investigate protonation and deprotonation processes in single-crystal samples of orthorhombic molybdenum trioxide (R-MoO 3 ). At low temperatures, a small part of R-MoO 3 is changed to needlelike H x MoO 3 (x ≈ 0.33) along 〈203〉 directions in a H 2 S/H 2 gas stream. When these elongated crystallites assemble into a maze structure, the growth of H x MoO 3 is gradually ceased due to closing entrance for hydrogen. At higher temperatures, the needlelike H x MoO 3 crystallites turn to a growth perpendicular to 〈203〉, which leads to the formation of H x MoO 3 blocks. It is observed that the basal plane of R-MoO 3 is severely buckled upon the protonation. Surface sulfidation is also observed. The formed H x MoO 3 or surface MoS 2 , however, can be readily converted back to their original-phase R-MoO 3 in air at 350-400 °C. This oxidation process gives rise to a flattened (010) topography (i.e., debuckling) on which shallowly divided R-MoO 3 surface blocks bounded with {101} planes are formed. When an R-MoO 3 (010) plane embedded with nanocrystallites is used to create surface stress or nucleation sites, the insertion mode of hydrogen along 〈001〉 is further reconfirmed in this work. A correlation of surface/bulk phases upon various chemical reactions is addressed, and a model to summarize these changes is also proposed.