IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/nbr/nberwo/28906.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

The Anatomy of Cyber Risk

Author

Listed:
  • Rustam Jamilov
  • Hélène Rey
  • Ahmed Tahoun

Abstract

This paper uses computational linguistics to introduce a novel measure of firm-level cyber-risk exposure based on quarterly earnings conference calls of listed firms. Our data span 13,000 firms from 85 countries over 2002-2021. We show cyber-risk exposure predicts cyber-attacks, affects stock returns and profits, and is priced in the equity option market. Cyber-risks spill over across firms and pass through from firm to sectoral level. The geography of cyber-risk is well approximated by a gravity model in which financial proximity is key. Back-of-the-envelope calculations suggest that the global cost of cyber-risk is over $200 billion per year.

Suggested Citation

  • Rustam Jamilov & Hélène Rey & Ahmed Tahoun, 2021. "The Anatomy of Cyber Risk," NBER Working Papers 28906, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  • Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:28906
    Note: AP IFM
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.nber.org/papers/w28906.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Tim Bollerslev & George Tauchen & Hao Zhou, 2009. "Expected Stock Returns and Variance Risk Premia," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 22(11), pages 4463-4492, November.
    2. Pástor, Ľuboš & Veronesi, Pietro, 2013. "Political uncertainty and risk premia," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 110(3), pages 520-545.
    3. Robert F Engle & Stefano Giglio & Bryan Kelly & Heebum Lee & Johannes Stroebel, 2020. "Hedging Climate Change News," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 33(3), pages 1184-1216.
    4. Scott R. Baker & Nicholas Bloom & Steven J. Davis, 2016. "Measuring Economic Policy Uncertainty," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 131(4), pages 1593-1636.
    5. Beber, Alessandro & Brandt, Michael W., 2006. "The effect of macroeconomic news on beliefs and preferences: Evidence from the options market," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 53(8), pages 1997-2039, November.
    6. Sha Wang & Jean-Philippe Vergne, 2017. "Buzz Factor or Innovation Potential: What Explains Cryptocurrencies’ Returns?," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 12(1), pages 1-17, January.
    7. Ralph S. J. Koijen & Tomas J. Philipson & Harald Uhlig, 2016. "Financial Health Economics," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 84, pages 195-242, January.
    8. Portes, Richard & Rey, Helene & Oh, Yonghyup, 2001. "Information and capital flows: The determinants of transactions in financial assets," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 45(4-6), pages 783-796, May.
    9. Bali, Turan G. & Zhou, Hao, 2016. "Risk, Uncertainty, and Expected Returns," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 51(3), pages 707-735, June.
    10. Portes, Richard & Rey, Helene, 2005. "The determinants of cross-border equity flows," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 65(2), pages 269-296, March.
    11. Antoine Bouveret, 2018. "Cyber Risk for the Financial Sector: A Framework for Quantitative Assessment," IMF Working Papers 2018/143, International Monetary Fund.
    12. Joel M. Vanden, 2008. "Information Quality and Options," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 21(6), pages 2635-2676, November.
    13. Hentschel, Ludger, 2003. "Errors in Implied Volatility Estimation," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 38(4), pages 779-810, December.
    14. Anil K. Kashyap & Anne Wetherilt, 2019. "Some Principles for Regulating Cyber Risk," AEA Papers and Proceedings, American Economic Association, vol. 109, pages 482-487, May.
    15. Eli Amir & Shai Levi & Tsafrir Livne, 2018. "Do firms underreport information on cyber-attacks? Evidence from capital markets," Review of Accounting Studies, Springer, vol. 23(3), pages 1177-1206, September.
    16. Jens Hilscher & Alon Raviv & Ricardo Reis, 2022. "Inflating Away the Public Debt? An Empirical Assessment," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 35(3), pages 1553-1595.
    17. Christian Biener & Martin Eling & Jan Hendrik Wirfs, 2015. "Insurability of Cyber Risk: An Empirical Analysis†," The Geneva Papers on Risk and Insurance - Issues and Practice, Palgrave Macmillan;The Geneva Association, vol. 40(1), pages 131-158, January.
    18. Bryan Kelly & Ľuboš Pástor & Pietro Veronesi, 2016. "The Price of Political Uncertainty: Theory and Evidence from the Option Market," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 71(5), pages 2417-2480, October.
    19. Patell, James M. & Wolfson, Mark A., 1979. "Anticipated information releases reflected in call option prices," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 1(2), pages 117-140, August.
    20. Peter Carr & Liuren Wu, 2009. "Variance Risk Premiums," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 22(3), pages 1311-1341, March.
    21. Anand, Kartik & Duley, Chanelle & Gai, Prasanna, 2022. "Cybersecurity and financial stability," Discussion Papers 08/2022, Deutsche Bundesbank.
    22. Healey, Jason & Mosser, Patricia & Rosen, Katheryn & Wortman, Alexander, 2021. "The Ties That Bind: A Framework to Assess the Linkage Between Cyber Risks and Financial Stability," Journal of Financial Transformation, Capco Institute, vol. 53, pages 94-107.
    23. Tim Loughran & Bill Mcdonald, 2011. "When Is a Liability Not a Liability? Textual Analysis, Dictionaries, and 10‐Ks," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 66(1), pages 35-65, February.
    24. Allen H. Huang & Reuven Lehavy & Amy Y. Zang & Rong Zheng, 2018. "Analyst Information Discovery and Interpretation Roles: A Topic Modeling Approach," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 64(6), pages 2833-2855, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Crosignani, Matteo & Macchiavelli, Marco & Silva, André F., 2023. "Pirates without borders: The propagation of cyberattacks through firms’ supply chains," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 147(2), pages 432-448.
    2. Küsters Anselm & Andritzky Jochen, 2024. "Welche Rolle spielt das Thema Zukunft im Bundestag?," Wirtschaftsdienst, Sciendo, vol. 104(4), pages 252-257, April.
    3. Zacharias Sautner & Laurence Van Lent & Grigory Vilkov & Ruishen Zhang, 2023. "Firm‐Level Climate Change Exposure," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 78(3), pages 1449-1498, June.
    4. Loic Mar'echal & Nathan Monnet, 2024. "Disentangling the sources of cyber risk premia," Papers 2409.08728, arXiv.org.
    5. Chang, Jin-Wook & Jayachandran, Kartik & Ramírez, Carlos A. & Tintera, Ali, 2024. "On the anatomy of cyberattacks," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 238(C).
    6. Boungou, Whelsy, 2023. "Cyber-attacks and banking intermediation," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 233(C).
    7. Daniel Celeny & Loic Mar'echal, 2024. "Cyber risk and the cross-section of stock returns," Papers 2402.04775, arXiv.org, revised Mar 2024.
    8. Anand, Kartik & Duley, Chanelle & Gai, Prasanna, 2022. "Cybersecurity and financial stability," Discussion Papers 08/2022, Deutsche Bundesbank.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Juan M. Londono & Mehrdad Samadi, 2023. "The Price of Macroeconomic Uncertainty: Evidence from Daily Options," International Finance Discussion Papers 1376, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    2. Zacharias Sautner & Laurence Van Lent & Grigory Vilkov & Ruishen Zhang, 2023. "Firm‐Level Climate Change Exposure," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 78(3), pages 1449-1498, June.
    3. Tarek A Hassan & Stephan Hollander & Laurence van Lent & Ahmed Tahoun, 2019. "Firm-Level Political Risk: Measurement and Effects," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 134(4), pages 2135-2202.
    4. Bryan Kelly & Ľuboš Pástor & Pietro Veronesi, 2016. "The Price of Political Uncertainty: Theory and Evidence from the Option Market," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 71(5), pages 2417-2480, October.
    5. José Ramón Martínez Resano, 2022. "Digital resilience and financial stability. The quest for policy tools in the financial sector," Financial Stability Review, Banco de España, issue Autumn.
    6. Baur, Dirk G. & Smales, Lee A., 2020. "Hedging geopolitical risk with precious metals," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 117(C).
    7. Himounet, Nicolas, 2022. "Searching the nature of uncertainty: Macroeconomic and financial risks VS geopolitical and pandemic risks," International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 170(C), pages 1-31.
    8. Bianconi, Marcelo & Esposito, Federico & Sammon, Marco, 2021. "Trade policy uncertainty and stock returns," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 119(C).
    9. Chris Florackis & Christodoulos Louca & Roni Michaely & Michael Weber & Itay Goldstein, 2023. "Cybersecurity Risk," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 36(1), pages 351-407.
    10. Bakas, Dimitrios & Triantafyllou, Athanasios, 2018. "The impact of uncertainty shocks on the volatility of commodity prices," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 87(C), pages 96-111.
    11. Gad, Mahmoud & Nikolaev, Valeri & Tahoun, Ahmed & van Lent, Laurence, 2024. "Firm-level political risk and credit markets," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 77(2).
    12. Carvalho, Augusto & Guimaraes, Bernardo, 2018. "State-controlled companies and political risk: Evidence from the 2014 Brazilian election," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 159(C), pages 66-78.
    13. Chatjuthamard, Pattanaporn & Mook Lee, Sang & Kim, Young S. & Jiraporn, Pornsit & Potosky, Denise, 2024. "Climate change and shareholder value: Evidence from textual analysis and Trump’s unexpected victory," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 180(C).
    14. Faria, Gonçalo & Kosowski, Robert & Wang, Tianyu, 2022. "The Correlation Risk Premium: International Evidence," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 136(C).
    15. José Ramón Martínez Resano, 2022. "Digital resilience and financial stability. The quest for policy tools in the financial sector," Financial Stability Review, Banco de España, issue Autumn.
    16. Faccini, Renato & Matin, Rastin & Skiadopoulos, George, 2023. "Dissecting climate risks: Are they reflected in stock prices?," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 155(C).
    17. Yin, Libo & Feng, Jiabao & Liu, Li & Wang, Yudong, 2019. "It's not that important: The negligible effect of oil market uncertainty," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 60(C), pages 62-84.
    18. Jiang, Fuwei & Liu, Hongkui & Yu, Jiasheng & Zhang, Huajing, 2023. "International stock return predictability: The role of U.S. uncertainty spillover," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 82(C).
    19. José Ramón Martínez Resano, 2022. "Digital resilience and financial stability. The quest for policy tools in the financial sector," Revista de Estabilidad Financiera, Banco de España, issue Otoño.
    20. Bouteska, Ahmed & Sharif, Taimur & Hajek, Petr & Abedin, Mohammad Zoynul, 2024. "Aversion and ambiguity: On the robustness of the macroeconomic uncertainty measure framework," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 203(C).

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • F3 - International Economics - - International Finance
    • G0 - Financial Economics - - General

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:28906. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/nberrus.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.