Who is it for?
Our finance courses are for students who want to progress with the knowledge and skills required for a successful career in the increasingly competitive world of global finance and banking.
The BSc Finance is for someone who knows they are interested in finance, and at this point would like to keep their eventual finance career options open. The skills you gain during your studies will equip you both for a career in finance or further, postgraduate study.
Objectives
Our three degrees in finance (Finance, Banking and International Finance, and Investment and Financial Risk Management) provide detailed knowledge of how financial markets work, how companies make investment, financing and acquisition decisions and how modern banks operate. If you are looking for a career in finance and weighing up which aspects of the field excite you the most, this course if for you.
This course will sharpen your understanding of the broad disciplines involved, from corporate finance to asset pricing, international finance to corporate governance. Throughout your studies, you’ll focus on quantitative methods, enabling you to understand the cutting-edge techniques in use today. In the second half of the finance degree, core modules allow you to create a bespoke degree that matches your own interests. As a result, you will gain a good understanding of financial markets, its activities, and its products.
The jobs in this field are both exciting and well paid. They demand intellectual rigour and commercial acumen, and by selecting this course, you too can prepare yourself with the skills and competencies these jobs require.
Structure
What will I learn?
On the undergraduate Finance programme, you will:
-
Develop a strong knowledge of quantitative techniques
-
Gain the ability to learn and adapt new techniques in any field of finance
-
Understand how you can help senior management draft or deliver strategy
-
Deepen your understanding of the various functions in a financial institution
-
Become competent in conducting minimally supervised or independent research.
Year 1
The first year is common across all three of our finance courses, with students from the various disciplines studying together. This provides our students with strong foundation to financial markets, banking, economics and quantitative methods. You will also gain an understanding of the tools used in applied investment analysis and enhance your mathematical, statistical and computing skills.
Students in year 1 will take 8 core modules which have a total credit value of 120 credits.
Core modules:
-
Banking and financial institutions
This module looks at key functions of banking firm. The emphasis is on what differentiates banks from other financial institutions, as well as the information problems inherent in the banking industry. Participants will understand why financial intermediaries exist and their role/impact on the global economy.
-
Business skills
This module covers communication skills, cognitive skills, IT skills, and social skills. The module aims to provide with an underpinning and understanding of a portfolio of key skills required in the business world to assist participants in their academic study and prepare them for their ensuing professional career.
-
Finance and investment
This module is an introductory course providing participants with a basic understanding of the financial analysis role in decision-making. More specifically, this module provides a basic level of the core principles of corporate finance, financial markets and investments.
-
Introductory financial accounting
This module focuses on the interpretation and use of financial accounting information as part of the effective operation of a business. Moreover it looks at the principles that underlie financial accounting, the application of these principles in recording transactions and the preparation of financial statements.
-
Macroeconomics
This module looks at the macro aspects of economics such as market growth/cycles, measurement of aggregate activity, basic demand side models of GDP determination, aggregate demand/supply, money in the economy, the transmission mechanism of monetary policy, fiscal policy and the public sector, balance of payments, FOREX and international trade.
-
Mathematics for finance
This module provides an introduction to the basic mathematical techniques used in finance to aid decision making, with illustrations to the relevant problems in finance. It gives you the mathematical foundations that are necessary in your second year Finance and Financial Econometrics courses.
-
Microeconomics
This module looks at the micro aspects of economics such as resource allocation, demand-supply and price, consumer demand, production and costs, oligopoly versus monopoly, as well as the roots of market failure/success.
-
Statistics for finance
This module provides an underpinning and understanding of the basic statistical techniques used in finance to aid decision making. It delivers the statistical foundations necessary for the more advanced finance modules.
Year 2
The first half of your second year continues to be consistent across all three finance courses, to further develop your theoretical knowledge of finance, investment and accounting. You also study econometrics, which forms the basis of modelling and testing in finance.
Hence, you will gain a good understanding of the relationship between financial theory and empirical testing, and application of this knowledge to the appraisal of the empirical evidence in corporate finance and capital markets.
In year 2 Students are required to take 6 core modules and 2 elective modules. The two elective modules chosen from a wide range, allow you to focus on areas relevant to your own interests and career aspirations, such as investment, finance and risk, accounting and real estate- enabling you to appreciate the usefulness of quantitative finance in today’s financial markets.
* At least 30 credits (two modules) attained in years 2 and 3 together must come from electives that are specifically relevant to the BSc in Finance. These modules are marked with an asterisk, and include the Final Year project.
Core modules:
-
Corporate finance and valuation
This module presents core corporate finance material, including topics such as company valuation and investment appraisal and examining questions including how should a firm set its dividend policy, from which sources should a company raise capital and how should companies decide on their acquisition strategy.
-
Derivatives
The module aims to build on the earlier Introduction to Finance module and applies finance theories and models to derivative securities with the aim of understanding the characteristics of derivatives, the use of derivatives, and their pricing.
-
Financial econometrics
This module aims to introduce participants to the fundamental econometric tools for empirical modelling, accustom them with applying these tools to estimation, statistical inference, and forecasting in financial markets; as well as to develop the necessary skills to critically interpret the results of such analysis.
-
Intermediate financial accounting
The course aims to develop a wider breadth of accounting knowledge and the ability to understand accounting information in the context of recognised accounting standards and prevailing legal requirements.
Elective modules:
-
Portfolio Theory & Investment Valuation *
-
Asset management
-
International Banking
-
Bank risk management
-
Company Valuation
-
Corporate Risk Manager
-
Intermediate financial accounting 2 *
-
Introduction to real estate investment
-
Risk analysis and modelling
-
Fundamentals of Management Accounting
-
Introduction to Business Law *
-
Economics for Business 2
-
Machine Learning for Finance
Year 3
The third year develops your knowledge of corporate finance, governance, and international finance to an advanced level. You will also select five or six electives which will allow you to extend your knowledge of finance and the applications of mathematical models, enhance your understanding of the role of financial markets or focus on areas such as investment or accounting. As a result, you will be able to demonstrate a good knowledge of the major theoretical tools and theories of finance, and their relevance and application to theoretical and practical problems, their assumptions and weaknesses, and ability to propose alternatives.
In year 3 Students are required to take 3 core modules and 5 elective modules (totaling 120 credits). Students with an average grade of less than 65 must do the Final Year Applied research project alongside two core and five elective modules. Students with an average grade of move than 65 may opt instead to take the Final Year Project alongside two core and four elective modules.
* At least 30 credits (two modules) attained in years 2 and 3 together must come from electives that are specifically relevant to the BSc in Finance. These modules are marked with an asterisk, and include the Final Year project.
Core modules:
-
Corporate Restructuring
This course examines several types of corporate reorganisations: mergers and acquisitions, leveraged buyouts, spin-offs, and divestitures, as well as reorganisations in financial distress situations through private workouts and bankruptcy. Particular emphasis is placed on linking conceptual tools and institutional environments to real business decisions.
-
Mergers and acquisitions
This course aims to provide a thorough understanding of the blend of strategic and financial concepts applied to M&A, but more importantly a recognition of the impact of corporate restructurings on organisations and people. At the end of the course, students will be able to form their own views about M&A and be prepared to make their own creatively strategic and analytically supportable recommendations regarding potential M&A transactions.
Elective modules:
-
Final year project *
-
Banking regulation
-
Financial services regulation
-
Monetary economics
-
Fixed income portfolio management
-
International finance
-
Advanced financial accounting: Theory and practice
-
Asset liability management
-
Bank strategy and management
-
Corporate social responsibility *
-
Emerging markets
-
Financial engineering *
-
Real estate finance and funding
-
Business forecasting
-
General insurance
-
Strategy for Business
