It’s time to invest in YOU
Tippie's Part-time Master of Finance curriculum is designed to accelerate careers and develop deep finance expertise.
Our program offers a mix of core finance courses along with a selection of electives that span the spectrum from real estate to risk management to data programming. You can customize your electives for a deeper focus on a particular subject area, or mix-and-match a diverse range of topics for a broader view of the impact of finance across industries.
Required core courses
Your Master of Finance degree requires at least 30 semester hours of core and elective course credit to complete. 6 core courses lay the foundation. Choose from the options listed below.
Corporate Financial Reporting (MBA:8140)
Contemporary financial reporting practices in the United States; how alternative accounting treatments affect the usefulness of financial information in applied decision settings. (3 s.h.)
Corporate Finance (FIN:9300)
Underpinnings and optimization of corporations’ investment and financing decisions; firm-wide and project-specific cost of capital, optimal capital structure decisions; in-depth capital budgeting methods, including real options techniques; corporate investment module of the class includes simulation analysis using Crystal Ball; cost of capital, valuation techniques, advanced capital budgeting, capital structure and dividend policy, option pricing models applied to corporate finance. Prerequisites: MBA:8180. (3 s.h.)
Data and Decisions (BAIS:9100)
Introduction to analytical techniques for making business decisions; utilizing Excel to apply descriptive and predictive analytical tools to solve practical business problems using real world data; dealing with uncertainty in decision making; formal probability concepts and statistical methods for describing variability (decision trees, random variables, hypothesis testing); application of techniques (linear regression, Monte Carlo simulation, linear optimization) to model, explain, and predict for operational, tactical, and strategic decisions. (3 s.h.)
Managerial Finance (MBA:8180)
Time value of money, applications of present value techniques; stock and bond valuation, capital budgeting, cost of capital calculation, portfolio formation and efficient market analysis, financial statement analysis, pro forma analysis, hedging financial risks.
Portfolio Management (FIN:9200)
Introduction to fundamental elements of modern portfolio theory, application to investment analysis; investment environment, instruments, types of investors; concepts of risk and return, broad perspective on historical risk and return of various asset classes; asset allocation decision, risk and return dynamics of a multiple securities portfolio; varied asset pricing models, how capital markets work for investors and users of capital. Prerequisites: MBA:8180. (3 s.h.)
Derivatives (FIN:9210)
Examination of the wide range of derivative securities that cover the financial landscape; the market place, trading, and investors; different derivative securities in existence, their relationship with the underlying securities, and pricing; applications of derivative securities to risk management and speculation; application of principles to fixed income, international finance, real estate, and securitization. Prerequisites: MBA:8180 and FIN:9200.
Electives
Elective courses broaden your understanding of finance across industries and professions. Choose any 4 courses from the list below, with at least 2 coming from List A.
List A
(Choose at least two courses)
Financial Modelling and Firm Valuation (FIN:9150)
How to model firm value from a discounted cash flow perspective; identify a company’s key value drivers, create spreadsheet valuation models; projected financial valuation integrates projected pro forma accounting statements; forecasting, free cash flow estimation, industry competitive analysis. (3 s.h.) MBA:8180 pre-req.
Corporate Financial Strategy (FIN:9310)
Major strategic decisions within the corporate form; risk management, including why firms engage in it, their methods for doing so, and exercises in the simulation of uncertainty; dividends and repurchases under the payout policy decision; corporate governance topics, including executive compensation, board structure, and institutional monitoring; merger and acquisitions analysis, including regulation, valuation, anti-takeover devices, payment method, and LBOs; divestitures and other restructuring topics, including corporate diversification, spin-offs, carve-outs, private workouts, and Chapter 11. Prerequisites: MBA:8180 and FIN:9300. (3 s.h.)
Real Estate Finance and Investments (FIN:9300)
In-depth understanding of concepts and techniques of real estate financial analysis, equity investment decision making; real estate investing from analysis of developments through the securitization of mortgages; mortgage markets and pricing, real estate finance and investments, mortgage-backed securities, development process, real estate valuation, tax effects, securitized real estate, real estate cycles, application of derivative instruments, strategic asset allocation. Prerequisites: MBA:8180. (3 s.h.)
Quantitative Finance and Deep Learning (FIN:9160)
Your introduction to quantitative investment and trading approaches. Includes quantitative security selection, portfolio construction, statistical arbitrage, and algorithm trading, plus emerging machine learning techniques in financial industry, including advanced regression methods, news sentiment analysis, and deep learning with applications in price forecasting and high frequency trading.
Wealth Management (FIN:9350)
Rapid growth of the field of wealth management over several decades, driven by general increase in personal wealth and increased responsibility for individuals to manage their own wealth; knowledge and tools to enter the financial services industry; financial planning industry, client characteristics, tax shield structures, insurance, asset allocation plans, estate planning, behavioral finance. Prerequisites: MBA:8180. (3 s.h.)
List B
Corporate Risk Management and Insurance (FIN:9130)
Introduction to corporate risk management and the risk management process; how insurance can be used as a risk management tool; standard commercial property and liability insurance contracts and their applications; fundamentals of insurance company operations and their distribution channels, rate making, underwriting, and claim settlements.
Enterprise Risk Management (FIN:9140)
Analysis and treatment of risks faced by businesses; how risk management creates value in corporations, includes development and implementation of the risk management process, and explores the application of various risk management techniques to identified exposures; use of case studies to study how businesses manage risk, and how insurance and other risk management tools help reduce the cost of risk. Prerequisites: MBA:8180. (3 s.h.)
Data Programming in Python (BAIS:6040)
Introduction to principles and practices of handling, cleaning, processing, and visualizing data using the Python programming language; basic data programming skills that can be applied to software development in any high-level programming language, data types, control structures, functions and modules, and other useful libraries for data manipulation and machine learning applications in Python. (3 s.h.)
Data Science (BAIS:6070)
Underlying concepts and practical computational skills of data mining tools including penalty-based variable selection (LASSO), logistic regression, regression and classification trees, clustering methods, principal components and partial least squares; analysis of text and network data; theory behind most useful data-mining tools and how to use these tools in real-world situations; software for analysis, exploration, and simplification of large high-dimensional data sets. (3 s.h.) Prerequisites: {MBA:8150 or BAIS:9100} and BAIS:6040
Text Analytics (BAIS:6100)
Concepts and techniques of text mining; the practice of using statistical tools to automatically extract meaning and patterns from collections of text documents. Topics include document representation, text classification and clustering, sentiment analysis, and topic modeling. (3 s.h.) Prerequisites: BAIS:6040 and BAIS:6070
Entrepreneurial Finance (ENTR:9200)
Financial aspects of launching and growing entrepreneurial ventures; topics include financial feasibility, financial forecasting and cashflow management, business valuation, sources of venture financing, deal structure, financing growth, and exit strategies. Prerequisites: MBA:8140
Course waivers
Students who have completed significant undergraduate coursework in one content area and meet the requirements may be eligible to waive the core course in that area. Individuals who have their Certified Public Accountant (CPA) licensure or Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) licensure are eligible to waive core courses as follows:
- CPA or CFA Level 1 = Corporate Financial Reporting (MBA:8140)
- CFA Level 1 = Managerial Finance (MBA:8180)
If you have earned previous graduate credit, you can submit this information for transfer review after program acceptance. To learn how waivers or transfer credit would impact your plan of study, talk with your advisor.
Stay in the know
Check out Exchange, an annual publication for finance alumni and friends.