The Clock Risk: Precision Timing Infrastructure and the National Security Risk Financial Markets Have Never Priced

Alessandro Di Criscio

MPRA Paper from University Library of Munich, Germany

Abstract: GPS is essential to modern financial markets for high-frequency trading, margin, and settlement. This infrastructure is extremely susceptible to "spoofing," in which attackers broadcast fictitious signals in order to change timestamps. Despite the systemic risk, this research finds that financial markets, across equity, options, and credit sectors, fail to price this vulnerability. This study identifies a structural "blind spot" brought about by the lack of a risk-modeling framework for timing failure by examining market responses to recorded spoofing instances. Foreign state actors might meddle with U.S. financial systems with plausible deniability in the absence of a necessary, functional, land-based backup system, posing a significant threat to national security.

Keywords: Precision Timing; GPS Spoofing; Financial Market Risk; Systemic Risk; Infrastructure Vulnerability; High-Frequency Trading (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: E44 G14 G2 G28 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2026-05-21
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:pra:mprapa:129300

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