An internal fraud model for operational losses in retail banking

Abstract

This paper develops a dynamic internal fraud model for operational losses in retail banking. It considers public operational losses arising from internal fraud in retail banking within a group of international banks. Additionally, the model takes into account internal factors such as the ethical quality of workers and the risk controls set by bank managers. The model is validated by measuring the impact of macroeconomic indicators such as GDP growth and the corruption perception upon the severity and frequency of losses implied by the model. In general,results show that internal fraud losses are pro-cyclical, and that country specific corruption perceptions positively affects internal fraud losses. Namely, when a country is perceived to be more corrupt, retail banking in that country will feature more severe internal fraud losses.