After completion of this core field, students will

• Have a broad overview of the different facets of finance. This includes the structure of modern finance as well as corporate finance and topics related to financial markets/instruments

• Understand the theoretical foundations of important financial tools and techniques

• Be able to systematically and correctly apply these financial tools and techniques to real-life situations, including analyzing and resolving personal or corporate financial problems (e.g. valuation of financial securities, personal investment strategies, corporate capital budgeting decisions, increasing shareholder value, other financial decision-making processes)

• Understand and be able to correctly apply the terminology used in finance and on the financial markets

• Be familiar with the most important data sources used in finance and on the financial markets (e.g. Reuters, Bloomberg, internet)

• See the cross-links between financial management and other business administration disciplines

• Be able to structure ideas as well as organize and work on projects in teams

A central role in the core field 'Financial Management' is the measurement and creation of shareholder value. At the beginning of the core field (in the VUE "Financial Management"), the students will get a broad overview of the field of finance. This overview will include personal and corporate finance perspectives, financial markets/instruments, and methods of determining shareholder value in practice. Building on this foundation, students will then have the opportunity to specialize in a special "Financial Management" topic that is related to the contents of the VUE. Special topics include mergers and acquisitions, investor relations management, sustainable finance, or international finance.

Students are expected to have a basic knowledge of finance (especially discounting and compounding, annuities and perpetuities, and the concepts of present value, net present value, and internal rate of return), mathematics (simple calculations), and statistics (basic concepts of statistics and probability theory like expected value, variance, standard deviation, covariance, and correlation). Most WU students should already have this knowledge from their previous studies. For students who are lacking these prerequisites, we will recommend specific online videos that are able to fill this gap.

Moreover, students should be motivated to enlarge their toolkit in financial decision-making. Of course, it will also be easier for the students if they have an interest in finance topics and a broad horizon in general.

Only one curricular restriction applies: The Project Seminar in Financial Management (FS) can only be taken after completion of Financial Management (VUE) and Special Topics in Financial Management (PI). Apart from that, there is no strict sequence, but we highly recommend attending the courses in the following order:

1. Financial Management (VUE)

2. Special Topics in Financial Management (PI); can be attended in the same semester as the VUE Financial Management, as PIs generally start in the second half of the semester after most of the VUE has been finished

3. Project Seminar in Financial Management

 

In the Department of Finance, Accounting & Statistics, there is a centralized system that assigns bachelor’s thesis topics to students every semester. Further information on this system and on the integration of CFM students into this system will be published at a later date.

Academic Lead: Prof. Manfred Frühwirth

Contact: +43 1 31336 4252 (if not available by phone: manfred.fruehwirth@wu.ac.at)

Course Instructors: The faculty of the core field 'Financial Management' will include WU faculty and experienced experts from the finance community. The core field faculty currently includes Christian Czernich (carpima Invest), Manfred Frühwirth (WU), Daniel Hill (WU), Stephanie Hörmannseder (WU), Edith Littich (WU) and Andreas Wosol (Amundi).