Financial Economics MSc

Year of entry: 2025

Course length: 12 months Full-time | 24 months Part-time

About the course

The demand for highly skilled experts in finance and financial economics continues to increase rapidly in the modern economy. This demand exists in the public sector (e.g. central banks and international organisations) and especially in the private sector (e.g. commercial banks and investment companies).

This course is designed for those who wish to pursue a future career in the realms of financial economics and finance. It combines an introduction to fundamental principles of investment science and training in the mathematical methods needed for the analysis of financial markets. The programme will expose students to quantitative techniques and theory that will be useful to any actor in the financial industry: a portfolio manager, a risk management consultant, or a financial analyst.

See the full course profile on our website >

Join one of the UK's Top 10 universities for Economics & Econometrics

(Times Higher Education Rankings 2024)

Be part of an internationally-recognised academic community which boasts three Nobel Prize winners in its history

Our graduates are among the most targeted by top UK employers

(High Fliers 2024)

Compulsory Units

Microeconomics
Macroeconomic Theory
Financial Economics
Applied Macroeconometrics
Mathematical Methods in Economic Analysis
MSc Dissertation

Optional Units

Development Microeconomics
International Macroeconomics
Poverty, Inequality and Government in Less Developed Countries
Microeconomic Theory - Information and Games
Economic Growth
Labour Economics

These are examples of units offered in 2023/24 and are subject to change.

See the full list of units and find out more on the full course profile >

Where will your degree take you?

The demand for economists continues to grow worldwide. Our degrees allow you to develop a variety of both subject-specific and transferable skills suited to a wide variety of roles, such as analytical skills, research, problem-solving and communication.

This course equips you with the skills you need to find work as a portfolio manager, risk management consultant, or financial analyst.

Most of our recent graduates have gone on to work with leading organisations in finance and banking, local and national government, consulting, accountancy, and at top universities, with job titles such as Economist, Analyst, Consultant, Accountant, Manager, and Researcher.

Many of our graduates choose to go on to research degrees (PhD), either at Manchester or at another leading university, where they expand the boundaries of our knowledge and pursue careers in research or academia.

Professor Igor Evstigneev

Programme Director, Financial Economics MSc

"Financial Economics is a fascinating area, having a history marked by outstanding achievements. A remarkable feature of this discipline is that its theoretical highlights (such as the Black-Scholes formula) turned out to be extremely important in practice. They created new markets essentially based on concepts suggested by academics. Nowadays the turnovers of these new markets, especially markets for derivative securities, are measured in billions.

This is perhaps the only example in the history of Economics when principles that have led to the emergence of a new economic reality were discovered by mathematicians – 'on the tip of the pen'.

The course will offer you an unforgettable tour through the beautiful land of Financial Economics guided by world-leading experts in the field."