CURRICULUM

MSF 8620: Advanced Corporate Finance (3 credits) 
Building on Foundations of Finance, course will further explore topics important to corporate finance decision-making including but not limited to: capital budgeting, cost of capital, capital structure.

MSF 8612: Investments (3 credits) 
Introduction to fixed income markets and securities. Techniques of valuation, interest rate determination and modeling, interest rate risk management, and bond portfolio management and strategies.

MSF 8615: Derivatives (3 credits) 
A comprehensive introduction to the markets for options, forwards, futures, swaps, and other related derivative instruments. The course is designed to develop an understanding of how derivatives markets operate, how derivatives are priced, and how they are used.

MSF 8647: Coding Applications for FIN 2 (1 credit)
Examination of contemporary issues and topics which relate to development in the field of finance. Topics vary from semester to semester and will be announced prior to registration. Pre-requisites vary depending on topic offered

MSF 8650: Professional Development Program I (0.5 credits) 
Topics cover the many facets of the process of career decision-making and goal-setting process, and adopt the positive understanding that career planning is a lifelong process; students gain knowledge of how to articulate skills and talents in a way that employers value.

Students select between the following courses to complete their Fall schedule:

MSF 8640: Portfolio Theory and Application (3 credits) 
A hands-on class where students manage real-dollar portfolios using various investment styles. Students provide the operational management of the funds and analyze investments. All students are members of the investment committee that makes all investment decisions. Each fund must be managed in compliance with its investment policy statement.

Or  

MSF 8611: Financial Markets (3 credits)
Liquidity, market structure, and trading in financial markets; alternative market structures and their economic and operational underpinnings; tactical trading decisions within different market structures using simulation software and real-time data services.

MSF 8651: Professional Development Program II (0.5 credits)
Topics cover the many facets of the process of career decision-making and goal-setting process, and adopt the positive understanding that career planning is a lifelong process; students gain knowledge of how to articulate skills and talents in a way that employers value.

Elective credits
Students must take 12 elective credits, at least 6 credits must be from MSF Spring course offerings and 6 credits can be from approved MBA course offerings.

MSF 8660: MSF International Immersion (1.5 credits, subject to enrollment)
Global project, focusing on international finance, in which student will incorporate a variety of knowledge gained in the MSF program. Immersion may be international or domestic.

MSF 8610: Financial Institutions (3 credits) 
An advanced, graduate-level course surveying the key topics relevant to financial institutions and the process of intermediation through a risk management lens.  Students will apply the theories learned in this course to numerous problems facing today's financial institutions and markets.

MSF 8626: Alternative Investments (3 credits) 
This course exposes students to the growing market for investments in non-traditional asset classes such as private equity, venture capital, hedge funds, commodities, natural resources, and real estate. The course will examine the risk-return characteristics of alternative investments, their correlation with conventional asset classes, and their use within diversified portfolios.  

MSF 8641: Portfolio Theory and Application II (3 credits) 
A hands-on class where students manage real-dollar portfolios using various investment styles. Students provide the operational management of the funds and analyze investments. All students are members of the investment committee that makes all investment decisions. Each fund must be managed in compliance with its investment policy statement. Restricted to MSF Students.

MSF 8646: Quantitative Finance (3 credits) 
The course provides a framework for understanding quantitative asset management by first overviewing pertinent quantitative equity research then by replicating and backtesting existing research insights to provide hands-on experience for financial model building, valuation and quantitative performance attribution. The class aims to develop student skills that are best suited for quantitative asset management, valuation and advisory, data analytics, risk management, and statistical arbitrage roles, while providing students with insights into the asset management industry landscape that are particularly relevant to quantitative equity researchers.

MSF 8611: Financial Markets (3 credits)*
Liquidity, market structure, and trading in financial markets; alternative market structures and their economic and operational underpinnings; tactical trading decisions within different market structures using simulation software and real-time data services. Note: this course may only be taken once but is open to students who did not complete this course in the Fall term.

MBA 8162: Big Data: Theories & Practices  (1.5 credits)
Numerous factors contributed to increasing the volume, velocity, and variety of data, resulting in the ‘big data’ phenomenon to become an unavoidable IT challenge. This course examines big data from both theoretical and practical perspectives in a condensed 2-weekend format.

MBA 8350: Analyzing and Leveraging Data (3 credits)
The course begins with a review of descriptive statistics, confidence intervals and hypothesis testing. These tools will be extended into regression analysis geared towards analyzing large data sets in order to make informed business decisions.

MBA 8529 Programming in R (1.5 credits)
The statistical programming language R is rapidly becoming the language of choice for business analysts due to its full array of software capabilities for data preparation, analysis, and graphical display. This course covers the fundamentals of the usage of R as a programming language, with emphasis on applications in business.  Students will learn how to use the software environment of R to efficiently source, manipulate and analyze data.

MBA 8453 - International Financial Markets (1.5 credits)
Global monetary system; balance of payments; foreign exchange markets; currency interest rates; credit derivatives and swaps; international financing; Euromarkets; and international portfolio management.

MBA 8444: Multinational Financial Management (1.5 credits)
Globalization and the multinational corporation; foreign direct investment and political risk; international parity conditions; foreign exchange market; currency derivatives market; foreign exchange risk management; foreign trade financing; managing the multinational financial system.

Please note that this sample list is neither comprehensive nor final, as non-MSF electives are subject to scheduling and availability through other graduate programs.