Professor Amil Dasgupta

Dr Dirk Jenter

This course is compulsory on the MSc in Finance (full-time), MSc in Finance (full-time) (Work Placement Pathway), MSc in Finance and Private Equity and MSc in Finance and Private Equity (Work Placement Pathway). This course is not available as an outside option.

Aimed at people with a good undergraduate degree and good quantitative skills, with some knowledge of economics.

• Financing
• Valuation

This core course provides a broad introduction to the key issues in corporate finance. The first half of the course, the Financing Module, investigates how companies should finance their activities by issuing securities (debt, equity and convertible claims) and the interaction of business policy with financial policy. The aim is to understand what factors determine optimal capital structure and how the interplay of these factors can affect financing decisions in a way that creates value. The second half of the course, the Valuation Module, covers firm and project valuation and establishes how companies should select among investable assets. The module focuses on fundamental valuation techniques based on discounting future cash flows. The course goes on to introduce further valuations methods, such as real options analysis, as well as key applications of valuation concepts to major corporate decisions such as mergers and acquisitions and initial public offerings. The course interweaves key conceptual material with a series of cases.

60 hours of lectures in the MT.

This course is taught in the interactive lecturing format. There is no distinction between lectures and classes/seminars; there are “sessions” only, and the pedagogical approach in each session is interactive.

Regular classworks will be completed, handed in and marked as part of formative assessment for this course.

The recommended textbooks for this course are Berk and DeMarzo, Corporate Finance and Higgins, Analysis for Financial Management. Other recommended readings from relevant journal articles will be included in a study pack.

Exam (80%, duration: 3 hours, reading time: 15 minutes) in the summer exam period.
In class assessment (20%) in the MT.