A product represents the lowest level of calculation and grouping within Slope. Products come in two types; Assets and Liabilities. A product represents a single asset (such as one corporate bond) or a single liability (such as one life insurance policy). The product contains the definitions for how to model that single entity or model point.
The setup and definition of a product does not differ between assets and liabilities. However, the distinction becomes important when setting up Portfolios. Only assets can be included in investment strategies, and only liabilities can be included in New Business Profiles.
Product Detail Screen
The product detail screen provides all the options and tools to create and edit products.
- Product Selector – This drop-down menu provides quick access to switch between different products for editing.
- Product Properties – This section displays the current details of the Product
- Actions – This section lists all available actions that can be taken on the Product. See below for more details on available actions.
- Variable List – All of the variables that have been defined on this product will appear in this list. Variables can be added, deleted, or edited from this list. A filter option is also available to help find the desired variable quickly.
- Editor – The editor is the main work area for making changes to the product. This area is used for the Product Actions and is the area where the Formula Builder will be displayed.
Product Properties
Name – A name for the product. This will be used to reference the product within various parts of the Model Development environment.
Description – A description of this product. This is for your reference only to provide an area to more fully describe what the product should be used for.
Termination Variable – A single termination variable must be defined for each product. This property of the product is used to select a product variable that tells the calculation engine when a model point is no longer in force and therefore does not need to be calculated anymore. When the value of this variable is TRUE for a model point in this product, it will stop being calculated for all subsequent time periods. Users can select any product variable, as long as that variable returns a Data Type of Boolean and is Time-Indexed. In this way, it is possible to define any logic desired to specify how model points get terminated during model runs.
Actions
Edit Product Details – This will allow you to edit the properties of the current product. See the section above for a description of each of the properties available.
Edit Model Point File Definition – Every product contains a Model Point File definition. The definition contains a list of the model point fields, along with their corresponding Data Types, that must be provided as inputs to the model in order to perform the needed calculations. These fields will often correspond to data that will be obtained from an administrative system and used as a starting point for the modeling process.
Product Variables
Product variables are the primary driver of the model calculations. The product variables represent all of the calculations necessary to model a single model point. The formulas are created, edited, and maintained using the Slope Formula Builder.