FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT

The course is divided in two parts
Part A - Introductory classes
Module 1 - Foundations of financial management (2 classes)
It provides fundamental notions of finance: risk premium, risk adjusted returns, capital structure of the firms.

Part B - Thematic research-oriented modules
These modules introduce specific themes whose interest lies either on the way issues are afforded (for example behavioral finance) or on their current relevance (for example, sustainable finance).
The modules will be the following:
• behavioral finance;
• entrepreneurial finance;
• fintech and funding;
• sustainable finance.

Students will be able to critically analyze research topics and papers.
They will also learn to write and present a structured analysis of a research paper (PhD students).
Master's students will be encouraged to write and present a research proposal which could be the first step of a thesis project.

The time value of money, compounding and discounting, the basics of financial accounting, the structure of the balance sheet and income statement, and notions like EBIT, EBITDA, operating cash flows and so on.

Module 1 - Foundations of financial management
Fundamental notions of finance: risk premium, risk adjusted returns, capital structure of the firms.

Module 2 - Behavioral finance
Behavioral finance is a relatively new field of research which has changed the way of approaching to financial decision making. It has introduced, besides the prescriptive approach showing what rational people should do, a descriptive approach depicting how people actually behave. The comparison between the approaches results in systematic differences of the actual behavior from the rational one. The relevance of behavioral finance is widely recognized and it offers new insights in empirical finance.

Module 3 - Entrepreneurial finance
Entrepreneurial firms are recognized as important drivers of innovation and employment. Their funding, even though may resemble the one of mature firms, shows specific challenges that calls for a separate research area. The challenges are empirically relevant because matching funding needs with the right funding source has a great impact on the success of the firms.

Module 4 - Fintech and funding
Fintech refers to the interactions between new technologies and financial services, both investing and funding. The module deals with the structuring of new funding sources and how they affect funding needs and trajectory of firms.

Module 5 - Sustainable Finance
Sustainable finance studies how finance (investing and funding) interplays not only with economic and financial issues, but also with social and environmental ones. Finance has often been accused to move companies towards a short term profit orientation: sustainable finance corrects this bias introducing a long term orientation where economic objectives are set together with the social and environmental ones.

Part A
Copeland T.E., Weston J.F., Shastri K., 2004, Financial Theory and Corporate Policy, The Addison-Wesley Series in Finance, 4th Edition: chapters 3, 5, 6, 10, 11, 13, 15.

Part B
References will be provided at the beginning of the course.

PhD students
Students have to write a short essay (< 2000 words, references excluded) on the chosen paper/topic, following this structure:
- Introduction and brief summary;
- Literature review (already in the article, but also beyond it);
- Unsolved issues, open problems, extensions, food for thought.
The essay is delivered after the end of the course within a deadline agreed on with the professor.

Master’s students
Students will deliver a written draft of a research project (< 2500 words, references excluded). The draft comprises:
- A short introduction where student explains the project and the research idea;
- A literature review on the topic;
- A concise and preliminary design of the empirical research which will be carried out.
The draft is delivered after the end of the course within a deadline agreed on with the professor.

Frontal lectures and guided class discussions.
More specifically, each module will be composed by:
- frontal classes taught by the professor introducing the topic, highlighting its main features and the most relevant research questions: why and how they are studied and what we know about them;
- classes where the professor guides the discussion about specific research papers.

English

written

This subject deals with topics related to the macro-area "Cities, infrastructure and social capital" and contributes to the achievement of one or more goals of U. N. Agenda for Sustainable Development