Postgraduate open day: Saturday 10 February 2024
Join our on-campus open day this February to talk to students and lecturers and find out how and when to apply.
Book my place69th for Business and Economics in the World
Times Higher Education World University Rankings (2023)
Designed for Economics and Finance graduates who aspire to analyst and decision-making roles.
Lancaster University is top 10 in The Complete University Guide 2024
This programme provides essential grounding for those aspiring to analyst and decision-making roles within corporate and commercial banking or within government and regulators.
You will become proficient with modern methods of econometric analysis, forecasting, and risk assessment. You will analyse financial markets, the institutional framework of the money and banking sectors, and the role of governments and central banks in shaping the financial environment. You will learn to work with macroeconomic models used by central banks, fiscal authorities, and research departments in financial institutions.
In your final term, your knowledge and skills will be used in writing a research dissertation on a project of your choice. You will be personally supervised by an expert in the subject area of your topic, while developing highly marketable experience in rigorous analysis and presentation of your work.
Our graduates go on to work in a variety of roles in banks and financial institutions, consultancies, central banks, and financial regulators. This programme is also excellent preparation for pursuing doctoral research.
2:2 Hons degree (UK or equivalent) in Economics, Finance or a related subject. You will have successfully completed modules in Macroeconomics, Microeconomics, Econometrics and Mathematics, including Calculus, Statistics and Probability, with consistent marks at 2:2 level.
We may also consider non-standard applicants, please contact us for information.
If you have studied outside of the UK, we would advise you to check our list of international qualifications before submitting your application.
We may ask you to provide a recognised English language qualification, dependent upon your nationality and where you have studied previously.
We normally require an IELTS (Academic) Test with an overall score of at least 6.5, and a minimum of 6.0 in each element of the test. We also consider other English language qualifications.
If your score is below our requirements, you may be eligible for one of our pre-sessional English language programmes.
Contact: Admissions Team +44 (0) 1524 592032 or email pgadmissions@lancaster.ac.uk
You will study a range of modules as part of your course, some examples of which are listed below.
Information contained on the website with respect to modules is correct at the time of publication, but changes may be necessary, for example as a result of student feedback, Professional Statutory and Regulatory Bodies' (PSRB) requirements, staff changes, and new research. Not all optional modules are available every year.
The purpose of this 15-credit module is to provide students with an introduction to (1) multiple regression techniques using Ordinary Least Squares (OLS) estimation and (2) the principal microeconometric techniques used for analysing cross-sectional and panel data, with emphasis placed on those techniques that are instrumental in the rigorous analysis of banking data.
The final element of the MSc is the dissertation, a substantial piece of independent work conducted over the summer months through to September. The dissertation gives you the opportunity to apply research techniques and relevant economic theory to a research topic.
This module will initially introduce students to core concepts in finance like time value of money, net present value analysis and alternative investment rules to assess investment decisions taken by firms and then moves on to the introduction of basic concepts related to financial markets, including definitions of key assets and market types as well as an understanding of the economics of financial markets with a focus on their functions, participants and organisational forms.
This module will then provide students with a good understanding of fundamental theories and techniques in finance that are of concern to all financial market participants, such as bond markets and term structure of interest rates, economics of derivatives markets, forward and future contracts, swap agreements. The module will place a particular emphasis on understanding how quantitative methods and techniques are used in financial markets.
This course studies the practical operation of banking institutions. The aim is a thorough understanding of the financial environment in which we all live, including the banks’ role in the payments system and in transmitting monetary and fiscal policy. These matters are of particular relevance today given the current problems of poor economic growth, higher inflation, interest rates and government debt following the Covid pandemic and the invasion of Ukraine.
The course starts with an analysis of banks' behaviour and their balance sheets, including capital structure, lending decisions and attitudes to risk, as guided by the central bank’s choice of official interest rates and ‘quantitative easing’. This is followed by a discussion of the origins and nature of the financial crisis of 2008 and the major developments in banking regulation that have resulted.
The final part studies banking and monetary policy in the international context, including the balance of payments and exchange rates. There is a particular focus on problems in the eurozone and the operation of the Eurosystem of central banks.
Throughout this course, the treatment will generally be non-technical and will be based on the observation of institutional practices and their implications.
The course introduces state-of-the-art methods used in current macroeconomics research to understand short-run business cycle and inflation dynamics, as well as economic stabilization policies.
We will develop a broad and deep knowledge of modern Dynamic Stochastic General Equilibrium (DSGE) macroeconomic models that employ microeconomic foundations and rational expectations. These models will be solved using advanced analytical and numerical-computational approaches. More specifically, we will use the DSGE neoclassical Real Business Cycle and New Keynesian frameworks to understand the different sources of aggregate economic fluctuations, and to examine the positive and normative roles of fiscal and monetary policies.
Finally, the course examines contemporary issues such as government debt financing through distortionary taxation, optimal (un)conventional monetary and fiscal policies in a zero interest rate-liquidity trap environment, and financial frictions.
The aim of the module is to provide students with the hands-on time-series skills to competently estimate, test and interpret market-risk forecasting and control models & techniques which are required in the current regulatory environment: Value-at-Risk, Expected Shortfall, backtesting, extreme-value distributions, and copula models.
This module introduces students to those aspects of microeconomics upon which the modern understanding of financial markets, asset-price determination, and financial intermediation is built.
This module builds on the fundamental question about the role of financial intermediaries (i.e., banks) in the economy and it unfolds by analysing the economic theory behind the deposit-collecting and loan-making function of depositary institutions. The objective of this module is to equip students with a solid understanding of banking from theoretical, empirical, and regulatory perspectives. This module assumes that students comprehend the foundations of corporate finance, monetary policy, and applied econometrics.
This module introduces students to key concepts in banking regulation and supervision so as to enable them to understand the effects of changes in regulation and supervision for banks, business activities and, ultimately, the real economy. The module draws extensively on publications by central banks and regulators. The objective of this module is to equip students with the skills to comprehend and analyse sources of instabilities in the financial system and evaluate their effect on other agents in the financial system.
This module builds on and extends the concepts covered in the core Foundations of Finance module in the first term. The major topics covered include capital budgeting, capital structure, corporate valuation, corporate restructuring, merger and acquisitions, dividend policies, and application of real options in corporate finance. The analytical tools and financial theories discussed in the module are brought together through in an assessed report for which you work in groups to undertake comprehensive corporate finance analyses on a real company.
In lectures we will use cases based on real companies to demonstrate the links between the various areas of corporate finance. A key objective of the module is to help you explore how the financing and investment policies of firms interact with each other and how the decisions have implications for corporate valuation.
This module contributes to the following CFA syllabus areas:
The aim of this course is to equip students with the tools necessary to enable them to make the core investment management decisions that managers face on a daily basis as well as the knowledge as to where they can find the information necessary to apply those tools. This course covers fundamental concepts and key issues in factor investing; equilibrium theories of asset pricing; mutual funds, ETFs and hedge funds; Environmental, Social and Governance; textual analysis in empirical asset pricing.
This module looks at what can happen to asset pricing in situations where market imperfections coincide with imperfections in investor rationality. It, therefore, explores the boundary between mispricing which can be exploited and that which cannot be exploited profitably.
The module lays the foundations for arbitrage, investment and wealth management, investment banking, and corporate finance. The material covered is at the frontier of academic and industry research, forming a conceptually advanced body of knowledge (CFA level III) which is of relevance for theory, research and practice.
Topics covered include:
Turbulent decades of economic crises and increased volatilities across all asset classes have brought about innovative and strategic derivatives solutions to manage financial risk and create value. Their failure has typically been due to a lack of understanding of how to use and price derivatives. Understanding derivatives’ dynamics, risks, valuations and uses has become more important than ever.
Although there is a plethora of derivatives structures, the key to understanding derivatives is that all financial products, no matter how complex, are portfolios of just two fundamental building blocks: a swap (forward) and an option. This course provides this understanding in a rigorous, consistent and coherent framework.
This module equips you with the latest skills in data science, financial econometrics and quantitative finance to analyse and model asset price dynamics using techniques at the research frontier in these areas, including the work with high-frequency data, relevant for the job market (especially in Quants) and the MSc dissertation streams.
It will teach you important features of financial time series, key modelling approaches in the field, how to use high-frequency data to construct the latest volatility estimators and the most appropriate methods for forecasting price volatility and risk. It will also give you practical experience of analysing market prices, constructing volatility estimators and designing forecasting analyses through empirical projects implemented with MatLab.
The financial markets and the world of investment management have undergone significant change since the global financial crisis. Investment managers need to keep abreast of these developments and take advantage of such changes. This module introduces the key changes in market conditions, including high-frequency trading, dark pools and the move to bring off-exchange instruments such as credit derivatives, on exchange. Within the world of investment management, we look at developments in liability-driven investment, alternative investments and new approaches to diversification.
The key objectives are to:
Endow students with an understanding of today’s financial markets, trading processes and decision-making (also on a high-frequency level)
Endow students with the concepts and ideas of advanced portfolio analysis
Endow students with an understanding of the subtleties of investment decisions and dealing with clients
Endow students with the relevant quantitative skills in this area for further advanced studies
Designed to develop your understanding of the principles governing the valuation of fixed income securities and their derivatives, this module examines the main problems and selected issues relevant in the management of interest rate risk, and the organisations and structure of debt markets. Topics covered include debt securities and markets, the measurement of interest rate risk, and embedded options and interest rate derivatives.
This module contributes to the following CFA syllabus areas:
Debt Investments (CFA levels I, II and III)
The purpose of this module is to give students a very solid grounding in the quantitative empirical research skills that are necessary in producing high-quality research, both in the academic as well as in the applied context, in the areas of empirical asset pricing and portfolio allocation.
Location | Full Time (per year) | Part Time (per year) |
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Home | £15,650 | n/a |
International | £31,500 | n/a |
There may be extra costs related to your course for items such as books, stationery, printing, photocopying, binding and general subsistence on trips and visits. Following graduation, you may need to pay a subscription to a professional body for some chosen careers.
Specific additional costs for studying at Lancaster are listed below.
Lancaster is proud to be one of only a handful of UK universities to have a collegiate system. Every student belongs to a college, and all students pay a small College Membership Fee which supports the running of college events and activities. Students on some distance-learning courses are not liable to pay a college fee.
For students starting in 2023 and 2024, the fee is £40 for undergraduates and research students and £15 for students on one-year courses. Fees for students starting in 2025 have not yet been set.
To support your studies, you will also require access to a computer, along with reliable internet access. You will be able to access a range of software and services from a Windows, Mac, Chromebook or Linux device. For certain degree programmes, you may need a specific device, or we may provide you with a laptop and appropriate software - details of which will be available on relevant programme pages. A dedicated IT support helpdesk is available in the event of any problems.
The University provides limited financial support to assist students who do not have the required IT equipment or broadband support in place.
For most taught postgraduate applications there is a non-refundable application fee of £40. We cannot consider applications until this fee has been paid, as advised on our online secure payment system. There is no application fee for postgraduate research applications.
For some of our courses you will need to pay a deposit to accept your offer and secure your place. We will let you know in your offer letter if a deposit is required and you will be given a deadline date when this is due to be paid.
The fee that you pay will depend on whether you are considered to be a home or international student. Read more about how we assign your fee status.
If you are studying on a programme of more than one year’s duration, the tuition fees for subsequent years of your programme are likely to increase each year. Read more about fees in subsequent years.
You may be eligible for the following funding opportunities, depending on your fee status and course. You will be automatically considered for our main scholarships and bursaries when you apply, so there's nothing extra that you need to do.
Unfortunately no scholarships and bursaries match your selection, but there are more listed on scholarships and bursaries page.
If you're considering postgraduate research you should look at our funded PhD opportunities.
Scheme | Based on | Amount |
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We also have other, more specialised scholarships and bursaries - such as those for students from specific countries.
Browse Lancaster University's scholarships and bursaries.
Join our on-campus open day this February to talk to students and lecturers and find out how and when to apply.
Book my placeThe information on this site relates primarily to 2024/2025 entry to the University and every effort has been taken to ensure the information is correct at the time of publication.
The University will use all reasonable effort to deliver the courses as described, but the University reserves the right to make changes to advertised courses. In exceptional circumstances that are beyond the University’s reasonable control (Force Majeure Events), we may need to amend the programmes and provision advertised. In this event, the University will take reasonable steps to minimise the disruption to your studies. If a course is withdrawn or if there are any fundamental changes to your course, we will give you reasonable notice and you will be entitled to request that you are considered for an alternative course or withdraw your application. You are advised to revisit our website for up-to-date course information before you submit your application.
More information on limits to the University’s liability can be found in our legal information.
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