Impact of COVID-19 on financial institutions: navigating the global emerging patterns of financial crime

Abstract

Purpose

The current COVID-19 pandemic has already proven to be one of the world’s deadliest crises in modern history with far-reaching impacts on different sectors of the global economy. The financial sector is among the most widely affected by the economic crisis occasioned by the COVID-19 pandemic. One of the most notable effects is related to financial crime. It is against this backdrop that the present study aimed to examine the impact of COVID-19 on financial institutions with the main focus being on financial crime

Design/methodology/approach

Its twofold objectives were to critically examine the global emerging patterns of financial crime and their association with the COVID-19 pandemic; and to investigate how financial institutions across the world have been responding to, managing, and dealing with the emerging patterns of financial crime brought about by (or linked to) the COVID-19 pandemic.

Findings

It was found out that as the pandemic ravages the world and pushes people and businesses to the very limits of their endurance, many financial sector stakeholders and players are responding in ways that put the entire financial sector and all its stakeholders at great risk. Specifically, COVID-19 pandemic has led to the emergence of new patterns of financial crime that were either unheard of or were not as rampant in the past.

Originality/value

Both the descriptive and correlation analyses produced by this study provide new insights into the impact of COVID-19 on financial institutions with a main focus on financial crime.

Citation

Wronka, C. (2022), "Impact of COVID-19 on financial institutions: navigating the global emerging patterns of financial crime", Journal of Financial Crime, Vol. 29 No. 2, pp. 476-490. https://doi.org/10.1108/JFC-03-2021-0073