Block 2: The Financial Environment

Markets and Investments

The Markets and Investments component will provide an understanding of the basic concepts of finance and their application to companies in the U.K. and elsewhere. It also describes the main financial markets and institutions which serve both companies and investors.

Through this module you will gain a thorough understanding of the basics of finance to work effectively in any business.

Learning outcomes:

• Financial institutions, markets and analysis
• Valuation of the firm, bonds and stocks – DCF, IRR, WACC
• Asset allocation, portfolio theory and the CAPM
• Equity investment strategies
• Derivative securities: futures, options and swaps

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Analytics for Business

Quantitative analysis of business data provides a key skill for success in the modern, data rich business environment. This module focuses on some of the most widely used techniques, related to data summary and sampling. The intention is not only to equip you with the practical skills to implement the necessary techniques, but to acquire the skills of discretion in choice of appropriate method and clarity in the interpretation of the output from such methods and extraction of the information of most importance to the business decision maker.

The aim of this module is to introduce you to some of the most important statistical tools used in business analytics, focussing on descriptive and predictive analytics. The focus is on application and interpretation of the tools and results.

Learning outcomes:

• Develop analytical skills in structuring and analysing business decision problems.
• Build analytical models for a variety of problems in a number of functional areas.
• Understand usefulness and limitation of selected techniques.
• Use software to generate computer solutions of the models.
• Demonstrate skills in interpreting the business significance and communicating the analysis and results of business decision problems.

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Business in the Global Economy

Gain a practical understanding of the tools and language used by economists to analyse individual and organizational behavior (microeconomics), and the functioning of economies and networks of economies as a whole (macroeconomics). This in turn is intended to give you an appreciation of the relevance to business and the financial markets of economic thinking, news about the economy, and high-level policy debates.

Learning outcomes:

• How economists think – economic systems, utility and individual decision-making,
• Consumer behaviour and demand – price and income elasticities, imperfect asymmetric information and marketing
• Production and costs – production function, economies of scale,  factor demands, average and marginal cost
• Supply and market structure – competition, monopoly and oligopoly, game theory
• Private markets and public policy – market equilibrium, taxes and subsidies, market failure and externalities
• Macroeconomics and growth – trend and cycle, economic and non-economic sources of growth and competitiveness
• Fiscal and monetary policy – countercyclical policy, successes and failures, inflation and unemployment
• Balance of payments, trade and exchange rates – patterns of trade, fixed and floating exchange rate regimes, globalisation