Re-pricing risk in the digital economy: A multi-wave analysis of technology-sector volatility during COVID-19

Type of the article: Research ArticleAbstractThe COVID-19 pandemic profoundly reshaped global financial markets, amplifying volatility and redefining risk perception across innovation-driven sectors. This study assesses how the COVID-19 pandemic altered volatility dynamics in the technology sector by quantifying wave-by-wave risk-return behavior using descriptive statistics, including standard deviation, coefficient of variation, and kurtosis. The analysis is based on daily stock prices and returns for the technology sector from March 8, 2019, to December 12, 2022, covering the pre-pandemic period, five pandemic waves, and a post-pandemic stabilization phase. The results reveal that market volatility surged during the first pandemic wave as digital adoption accelerated and investors sought technological assets as temporary safe havens. Subsequent waves showed alternating phases of speculative trading and market corrections, reflecting evolving investor sentiment and macroeconomic uncertainty. The coefficient of variation increased sharply during the height of the crisis, demonstrating that risk consistently exceeded returns, while kurtosis analysis indicated a higher frequency of extreme price movements compared with pre-pandemic conditions. Although volatility gradually declined during the post-pandemic period, it remained notably above pre-2020 levels, signaling a persistent re-pricing of sectoral risk. These findings confirm that the technology sector, while resilient, experienced structural changes in its volatility regime and investor behavior, with lasting implications for market stability and portfolio management in the digital economy.AcknowledgmentThis article is one of the partial outputs of the currently implemented research grant VEGA no. 1/0110/24 and research grant IGMP no. I-25-103-00.