MSc in Economics and Business Administration - Finance and Strategic Management

Content and Structure

Finance and financial instruments
Understanding and using financial analysis and instruments is central in this concentration. You will learn to interpret key figures for budgeting decisions, but also discus different ways for a company to finance itself and allocate its capital. From here you will develop a deeper understanding of how knowledge of finance can influence strategic decisions and company value. For instance, you will learn how best to design the pricing and payout policy for stocks, or how to apply insight from financial markets in the selection of investment portfolios. You will also be working with tools for calculating and managing financial risk. This will enable you to test and evaluate what potential risk, profit and impact a financial decision will create.

Governance and organisation
You will also come to appreciate how insights into the economics of company organisation can be of great value. With this understanding, you will for instance be able to provide an analysis for decisions on how a company should organise itself, how and in what market it should compete, or whether it should make or buy a specific good or service. In combination with this, you will learn how different structures of ownership or organisation will influence both the finances and the governance of a company. An example of this could be to create incentives and contracts that regulate behaviour and realign the differences in stakeholder interests, while keeping the cost of these transactions to a minimum.

Corporate and managerial strategy
The strategic courses will teach you both theoretical and practical approaches to strategic management. This could for example be perspectives on leadership approaches or managerial processes that ensure optimal strategic actions. Through this you will discover that the complexity and paradoxes encountered in the process of strategy formulation, requires more than raw financial data. By learning to incorporate knowledge from all corners of the company, like the organisational learning potentials, logistical challenges or financial insights, you will be able to formulate optimal strategies for global sourcing. For instance, by exploiting the competitive advantage of the company and its suppliers, or by using the advantages of location in various countries to get ahead in the global competition.

Structure

Finance and Strategic Management is a two-year master’s programme that is divided into 4 semesters. The fall semester runs from September through November with exams in December and January; and the spring semester from February through April with exams in May and June. There are eight mandatory courses in the first year, and elective courses followed by a Master’s thesis in  the second.

There is a certain degree of progression between the courses in  the first year. In particular Corporate Finance and Strategic Management are essential for understanding the founding concepts, and several of the other courses build on knowledge from these two.

Additional options

In  the second year you have the option to apply for the CEMS programme.
You can also use part of your third semester to obtain a minor in one of the specialised minor programmes.

Course overview

You can find course descriptions in the programme regulations for Finance and Strategic Management.