Hi all,

I've been asked to give a 15 minute presentation at an insurance conference introducing the D programming language. At the end of the presentation, I shall include example of companies in the "success stories" part of the Dlang website, but I wondered if there are any actuaries hiding in the community that are using D for reserving, pricing, capital modelling, or insurance infrastructure, so that I can use what they are doing as a highly relevant example.

Thanks

On Saturday, 6 March 2021 at 19:53:30 UTC, data pulverizer wrote:
> Hi all,
>
> I've been asked to give a 15 minute presentation at an insurance conference introducing the D programming language. At the end of the presentation, I shall include example of companies in the "success stories" part of the Dlang website, but I wondered if there are any actuaries hiding in the community that are using D for reserving, pricing, capital modelling, or insurance infrastructure, so that I can use what they are doing as a highly relevant example.
>
> Thanks

Symmetry investments almost definitely do this kind of this (in a vague sense) - whether they can tell you anything about is another matter.

On Sunday, 7 March 2021 at 05:23:38 UTC, Max Haughton wrote:
> [snip]
>
> Symmetry investments almost definitely do this kind of this (in a vague sense) - whether they can tell you anything about is another matter.

Hedge fund != actuary

On Sunday, 7 March 2021 at 11:26:53 UTC, jmh530 wrote:
> On Sunday, 7 March 2021 at 05:23:38 UTC, Max Haughton wrote:
>> [snip]
>>
>> Symmetry investments almost definitely do this kind of this (in a vague sense) - whether they can tell you anything about is another matter.
>
> Hedge fund != actuary

As far as I understand, calculating risks is a big thing at Symmetry. That's a core activity for an actuary as well.

— Bastiaan

On Sunday, 7 March 2021 at 11:43:11 UTC, Bastiaan Veelo wrote:
> [snip]
>>
>> Hedge fund != actuary
>
> As far as I understand, calculating risks is a big thing at Symmetry. That's a core activity for an actuary as well.
>
> — Bastiaan

Calculating risks is a big field. There will certainly be some overlap between techniques that an insurance firm (particularly on annuities and as it relates to asset management) and a hypothetical hedge fund might use. However, actuaries are also thinking about a wider range of risks. For instance, a life insurance company cares a lot more about longevity risk than most hedge funds. Both might care about how market risks affect them.

In addition, there are many different types of hedge fund (e.g. equity long/short or discretionary macro). The risks that hedge funds focus on will be different across different strategies (and some may take more or less quantitative approaches to thinking about those risks).

On Sunday, 7 March 2021 at 12:11:53 UTC, jmh530 wrote:
> On Sunday, 7 March 2021 at 11:43:11 UTC, Bastiaan Veelo wrote:
>> [snip]
>>>
>>> Hedge fund != actuary
>>
>> As far as I understand, calculating risks is a big thing at Symmetry. That's a core activity for an actuary as well.
>>
>> — Bastiaan
>
> Calculating risks is a big field. There will certainly be some overlap between techniques that an insurance firm (particularly on annuities and as it relates to asset management) and a hypothetical hedge fund might use. ...

Rumors that a hedge fund is using some technology or another always plays well - almost regardless of the audience, so I might lean into the fact Symmetry is using D a little more.

Any further details not already in the DConf videos and on GitHub libraries would be useful.

Thanks

On Sunday, 7 March 2021 at 19:06:47 UTC, data pulverizer wrote:
> Any further details not already in the DConf videos and on GitHub libraries would be useful.

Symmetry invests heavily in D. They hire several new D programmers every year, run the Summer Autumn of Code (like Google Summer of Code, but focused on D Language.)

Laeeth Isharc, member of Symmetry's governing body, the Executive Committee, regularly visits and comments in the D forums. https://symmetryinvestments.com/about-us/

On Sunday, 7 March 2021 at 19:06:47 UTC, data pulverizer wrote:
> On Sunday, 7 March 2021 at 12:11:53 UTC, jmh530 wrote:
>> On Sunday, 7 March 2021 at 11:43:11 UTC, Bastiaan Veelo wrote:
>>> [snip]
>>>>
>>>> Hedge fund != actuary
>>>
>>> As far as I understand, calculating risks is a big thing at Symmetry. That's a core activity for an actuary as well.
>>>
>>> — Bastiaan
>>
>> Calculating risks is a big field. There will certainly be some overlap between techniques that an insurance firm (particularly on annuities and as it relates to asset management) and a hypothetical hedge fund might use. ...
>
> Rumors that a hedge fund is using some technology or another always plays well - almost regardless of the audience, so I might lean into the fact Symmetry is using D a little more.
>
> Any further details not already in the DConf videos and on GitHub libraries would be useful.
>
> Thanks

We use D very heavily at Symmetry and have been investing time and money in to using it for 4-5 years, with the amount invested increasing significantly over that time. Since I started getting involved back then it's gone from me chatting to Laeeth to a substantial number of full-time D programmers with quite a few familiar faces from these forums & dconf. It's definitely beyond the rumour stage at this point!

We are hiring D developers and people with experience in other languages, opportunities to write D are plentiful at Symmetry. See https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26312185 for more details.

On Monday, 8 March 2021 at 10:18:48 UTC, John Colvin wrote:
> We are hiring D developers and people with experience in other languages, opportunities to write D are plentiful at Symmetry. See https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26312185 for more details.

Cool. I've just emailed in my CV. The link indicates to use the email "hiring at symmetry.dev" which I got an email failure so I used "hiring at symmetryinvestments dot com" as well as the CC email address which went through. I hope this is okay.

Thanks.