CYBERSECURITY AS A STRATEGIC RESOURCE FOR BANKS’ MARKET POSITIONING IN THE DIGITAL ECONOMY

Abstract

The article substantiates the interpretation of cybersecurity as a strategic resource that directly influences banks’ market positioning in the digital economy. It shows that as banking services migrate to digital and remote channels and cyberthreats intensify, cyber resilience extends beyond operational protection to strategic governance, shaping trust, reputational and moral capital. The study synthesizes recent scholarship on cybersecurity in the banking sectors of Ukraine and other countries and analyses contemporary EU regulatory approaches to digital operational resilience and cyber risk governance. The findings confirm that the quality of cyber risk management is becoming a material driver of competitive differentiation: mature governance, disciplined risk assessment, resilient architectures, transparent incident handling, and controlled third-party dependencies increase perceived reliability and support customer retention. In wartime conditions the strategic value of cyber resilience increases further because attacks target payment infrastructure, customer data, and service continuity; therefore, resilience must be treated as a strategic capability and a reputational safeguard. Cybersecurity is conceptualized as an integrated strategic resource combining technological controls, organizational processes, regulatory alignment and behavioural factors, which collectively determine a bank’s ability to sustain secure operations and maintain stable market positioning under high turbulence. The author proposes a logic for embedding cyber resilience indicators into the bank’s Balanced Scorecard by linking measurable cyber metrics to strategic objectives across customer, internal process, learning and growth, and financial perspectives. The paper argues for using indicator clusters such as governance maturity, vulnerability management speed, detection and response performance (e.g., time to detect and time to recover), continuity of critical services, third-party risk control, and staff awareness. Practical implications include prioritizing resilience investments, strengthening accountability and training, improving disclosure and communication to protect trust, and aligning cyber strategy with digital transformation goals. Directions for further research are outlined for developing sector-specific indicator systems and empirically evaluating how cyber resilience affects positioning in different banking models.