MBA Finance Courses
FIN 60210 Microeconomic Analysis
Microeconomic Analysis studies the role of prices and markets in allocating scarce resources. Topics include the analysis of consumer preference and demand, production and cost, market structure, externalities, uncertainty and information and game theory. Although the emphasis is on applications, the analysis is carefully built upon basic principles.
FIN 60220 Macroeconomic Environment
Students will be provided the foundation to understand the global economic environment in which managers make business decisions. This foundation includes the analytical, as well as the practical, understanding of the basic determinants of production, unemployment, inflation, the balance of international trade and exchange rates. The role of government policy in influencing both the short- and long-term trends in these macroeconomic variables is also discussed.
FIN 60400 Finance I
Financial Management provides the framework necessary to understand and alleviate the problems facing the financial manager. Topics covered include valuation, capital budgeting, the cost of capital and capital structure. Throughout, the course emphasizes the efficient allocation of resources and the creation of shareholder value.
FIN 70230 Business Forecasting
Forecasts may be either subjective or objective. A subjective forecast can be prepared by reading extensively about a situation and the economy and then combining this information through some unspecified judgment process to come up with a forecast. The objective approach to forecasting involves developing a model, which is generally constructed by studying past relationships between the item to be forecast and the factors thought to affect it. This course concentrates on these objective methods of forecasting. Economic forecasting in general, and this course in particular, are designed to explain the nature of the real world; the intent is to integrate theory and application.
FIN 70330 Commercial Banking
The objective of this course is to give the student a working knowledge of how a commercial bank is managed. The student will study bank management from the point of view of a chief executive officer. When completed, the student will have a macro understanding of the industry and the challenges facing senior management of a commercial bank. To a lesser extent, students will discuss how to use a bank (or any type of financial institution) to their advantage, whether that be as a consumer, a small businessperson or a chief financial officer of a larger company.
FIN 70410 Mergers and Acquisitions
The objective of this course is to facilitate understanding of corporate merger and acquisition activity, restructurings, and corporate governance. This includes exploring the theory and evidence regarding these topics; the motives for these transactions, the sources of value-added, and managerial incentives to engage in or resist these activities. I In this class, you will learn how to apply discounted cash flow and other techniques for valuation purposes. Case projects and valuation assignments will be used to apply financial theory and valuation techniques in real-world situations. Classroom discussion of current M&A related activities will be used to reinforce key concepts. The structure of the class is a combined lecture/class discussion format with an emphasis on active learning. We will rely heavily upon case studies of past events and news articles of current events to illustrate how financial theory can be applied in an actual business environment.
FIN 70430 Financing the Corporation
This course will focus primarily on how corporations raise money in various ways to meet their funding needs, both short- and long- term. The first portion will look at domestic, U.S. dollar funding mechanisms and the second portion will cover funding in foreign currencies. The course will cover private and public debt markets , the Eurobond, market and how multinationals use derivatives to manage their required international financing.
FIN 70440 Financial Policy
This course will cover some of the classic topics of corporate finance: dividend policy, capital structure, costs of issuing securities, maturity structure of debt, financial considerations in mergers, and the interrelationships between financial policy and corporate governance. It is not so much a tools course as a course that uses theoretical and empirical research to provide approaches to various financial decisions. Emphasis is on learning the relevant concerns and issues for financial decisions. Most of the class periods will be devoted to lectures with some cases used.
FIN 70450 Bond Issue Process
This course will primarily concern the issuance of a "mock" corporate bond, with the process being as "real life" as possible, inlcuding the involvement of a major investment banking firm in the process. This will involve an initial in-classs "pitch" by the investment bank and subsequent weekly conference calls, leading up to the launch of the issue. The transaction will include a swap of some sort, either interest rate or cross currency. Each member of the class will act as a financial analyst for the issuer and be required to take an active role in the process.
FIN 70460 IPO's and Venture Capital
We will first look at Initial Public Offerings, or IPOs. Topics include: how IPOs are done in the U.S.; how they are done in other countries; the recent scandals and calls for reform; auctions, both IPO auctions and others, and whether they can be expected to work for IPOs; the Google IPO; and alternative proposals for reforming the IPO systme in the U.S. You will be learning about various types of auctions in detail, and we will spend much time looking at how IPOS have performed and what methods have been used in other countries, outside the U.S. Case studies will include a U.S. IPO, Netflix, and a Hong Kong IPO, Tom.com. For the venture capital/private equity market, we will discuss how to negotiate funding, how to structure deals to avoid conflicts and optimize performance incentives, and how to manage private equity investments (for examples, by helping the entrepreneur in non-financial matters). Case studies will cover some of the choices and problems that may arise. We will explore new venture financing from three different perspectives: the entrepreneur's, the venture capitalists, and that of the investors backing the VC (such as pension funds and college endowments). If we want to understand how private equity investors such as venture capitalists and entrepreneurs can create value despite high degrees of uncertainty and asymmetries of information, we also need to understand the VC's own incentives and constraints. These are linked to the fund-raising cycle and the structure of a fund. VCs are continually raising new funds and the terms on which they do so influence their behavior. For an entrepreneur, it is critical to understand how. This section will also deal with issues arising form the way in which outside investors exit their venture investments (typically by taking them public or selling them to another corporation). Having already covered IPS, we will discuss the trade-offs between an IPO and a sell-off.
FIN 70500 Multinational Financial Management
This course deals with the elements of the international business environment and their effect on the resource allocation decisions of the multinational manager. The course focuses on the corporate decision-maker, his or her analysis of the multinational environment, anticipation of the firm's interaction with that environment and the use of decision models to select among alternative courses of action.
FIN 70510 Applied Global Money Management
This course provides an opportunity to blend the theory of international investments with the practical demands of managing a "live" portfolio of international equity and bond investments. Academic objectives include developing an understanding of the process of establishing and implementing a portfolio strategy; allocation of assets between equities and fixed income; equity valuation of multinational firms; forecasting countries' macroeconomic outlooks; foreign exchange rate forecasting; and evaluation of a portfolio's performance.
FIN 70600 Finance II
This course covers topics that the Finance Department faculty believes are important for all MBAs to understand. These topics include theory, empirical results, and institutional aspects of finance. Because this is a core course taken by almost all two-year MBAs, the intention is to focus on principles and fundamentals rather than details. The course covers some of the most important and powerful ideas in finance. For example, it covers three sets of ideas that each earned the Nobel Prize in economics for their authors. By understanding these principles and how to apply them, you will be more effective business professionals no matter what your area of specialization.
FIN 70610 Equity Valuation
This course deals with the theory and practice of evaluating securities in a global capital market - both stocks and bonds. The emphasis is on the application of finance, economics, accounting and statistics to the valuation of the aggregate stock market, alternative industries and the stocks of individual firms. There is also an analysis of investment-grade and high-yield bonds as well as an application of a bankruptcy prediction model.
FIN 70620 Options Markets
This course examines options markets, serving as an introduction to the dynamic world of derivatives. The goal is to provide rigorous applied training that prepares students for employment with firms where derivatives are either of primary importance (e.g., investment banks, trading firms) or secondary importance (e.g., corporations having interest rate or foreign exchange rate exposure that requires hedging). Topics include fundamental pricing relations and models (e.g, the Black-Scholes and binomial models), trading strategies for individuals and corporations (e.g., covered calls, protective puts, spreads, etc.), and risk management. Although both financial and commodity derivatives are discussed, the course emphasizes financial derivatives for which the underlying assets are stocks, bonds, or foreign exchange. Classes typically include both lectures and discussion. There are two required textbooks: (1) An Introduction to Derivatives and Risk Management, 6th Ed., by Don Chance, and (2) Risk Takers: Uses and Abuses of Financial Derivatives, by John Marthinsen. These texts are also used for FIN 70630 and FIN 70660.
FIN 70630 Futures Markets
This course examines future markets, serving as an introduction to the dynamic world of derivatives. The goal is to provide rigorous applied training that prepares students for employment with firms where derivatives are either of primary importance (e.g., investment banks, trading firms) or secondary importance (e.g., coporations having interest rate or foreign exchange rates exposure that requires hedging). Topics include fundamental pricing relations and models (e.g., the cost of carry model), trading strategies for individuals and corporations (e.g., cash and carry trades, program trading, and portfolio insurance), and risk management. Although both financial and commodity derivatives are discussed, the course emphasizes financial derivatives for which the underlying assets are stocks, bonds, or foreign exchange. Classes typically include both lectures and discussion. There are two required textbooks: (1) An Introduction to Derivatives and Risk Management, 6th Ed. by Don Chance, and (2), Risk Takers: Uses and Abuses of Financial Derivatives, by John Marthinsen. These texts are also used for FIN 70620 and FIN 70660.
FIN 70640 Applied Investment Management
Applied Investment Management provides an opportunity for students to blend the theory of investments with the practical demands of hands-on investment management. The practical objectives are achieved by hands-on management of a real portfolio. Periodically, guest speakers who are security analysts and/or portfolio managers are iinvited to share practical insights on the investment management process.
FIN 70650 Fixed Income Securities
This course deals with an understanding of U.S. and global bond markets and traditional and evolving bond instruments including bond structures with embedded options. We will consider the techniques for valuing option-free bonds, the term structure of interest rates, the analysis of bonds with embedded options, as well as active and passive bond portfolio management strategies and the benchmarks used to evaluate bond portfolio performance.
FIN 70660 Advanced Derivatives
Intended to follow an introductory derivatives course, this course uses basic concepts involving options and futures as a springboard into several advanced topics. The goal is to provide rigorous applied training that prepares students for employment with firms where derivatives are either of primary importance (e.g., investment banks, trading firms) or secondary importance (e.g., corporations having interest rate or foreign exchange rate exposure that requires hedging). Topics include swaps; interest rate forwards, options, and swaptions; advanced derivatives and strategies (e.g., digital, chooser, and path-dependent options); risk management techniques (e.g., VAR); and organizational risk management. Classes typically include both lecture and discussion. There are two required textbooks: (1) An Introduction to Derivatives and Risk Management, 6th Ed., by Don Chance, and (2), Risk Takers: Uses and Abuses of Financial Derivatives, by John Marthinsen. These texts are also used for FIN 70620 and FIN 70630.
FIN 70810 Real Estate
The objective of this course is to build fundamental real estate investment analysis skills at the micro level (individual property), specifically "how to structure a real estate deal to acquire an income producing commercial property". It is an entrepreneurial course using multiple case histories to demonstrate the use of key analytical tools. The primary emphasis of the course will focus on helping students to understand how to identify, analyze, finance, operate, and sell an income producing commercial property.