Curious about studying Finance (Including Placement Year) - BSc (Hons)at University of Essex? We've gathered all the key details—entry requirements, modules, fees, and more. Hear from real students by checking out reviews, or take the next step by booking an open day to explore it for yourself.
Bachelor of Science (with Honours) - BSc (Hons)
University of Essex
Full Time
Oct 2026
4 Year
The degree prepares you for a fast-paced career across the finance sector. You will explore how financial markets function, how organisations make financial decisions, and how finance supports strategy, leadership and business growth. Throughout your studies, you will develop strong analytical and quantitative skills while applying theory to real-world financial challenges. Your first year ensures you receive a fully-rounded business education by introducing you to topics such as marketing, management and accounting. Following a shared first year, students can specialise in one of four pathways and graduate with one of the following degrees, depending on their chosen area of focus: * BSc (Hons) Finance (FinTech and Big Data) * BSc (Hons) Finance (Sustainable Finance) * BSc (Hons) Finance (Banking) * BSc (Hons) Finance (Management) In your final year, you have the opportunity to put your knowledge into practice by completing an in depth, independent research project or dissertation. This gives you the chance to further develop vital employability skills in areas of research, project management and critical thinking.
Why this course?The BSc (Hons) Finance at Essex will help you understand how financial markets, investment decisions and corporate finance shape businesses and economies. You'll develop the analytical, quantitative and commercial skills needed to thrive in the global financial sector. Add a placement year or study abroad year to put your learning into practice, expand your perspective and build confidence in professional or international settings. You'll graduate on the path to becoming a finance professional, with the foundations needed to specialise in areas such as corporate finance and financial decision-making.
This module introduces financial accounting and basic principles and techniques needed to analyse and interpret financial statements. Although the module is intended as an introduction for students majoring in accounting it will also benefit students who wish to gain some insight into the practices of accounting. You’ll look at the nature and role of accounting and consider who uses accounting information and for what purposes. You’ll discuss the contents of annual reports, especially the narrative sections, and the qualitative characteristics of accounting information. Finally, the module will be concerned with key elements and the format of financial statements. You’ll earn to prepare company financial statements using trial balance and cover the techniques that can be used to analyse and interpret financial statements.
This module is intended for students majoring in accounting and those who have a keen interest in gaining an understanding of elementary financial accounting. Learn the basic principles and techniques for preparing and constructing a set of comprehensive financial statements. The module commences with an introduction to double-entry booking keeping and accounting equations that govern the recording of business transactions. You’ll then discuss the recognition and measurement principles for accounting for some key items in financial statements, including inventory, accruals, prepayments, long-term assets, and long-term finance, using International Financial Reporting Standards as reference. Finally, the preparation of financial statements from the trial balance for various types of entities, incorporating a variety of simple adjustments.
Quantitative Methods and Finance is an introduction to the subject of quantitative methods and their applications in finance, accounting and management. The module is designed to provide a sound foundation for your future studies in finance, accounting or management. The topics covered include maths revision, the time value of money, rates of change (calculus), statistics, probability distributions and simple regression.
Introduction to Finance is designed to give you an introduction to the wider finance subject area ass well as firm foundation for further studies in finance. You’ll gain a overview of the financial system, instruments and markets, and ideas about finance concepts and problems. The topics covered include investment companies, return and risk, and behavioural finance. You’ll develop and be able to transmit knowledge about the financial system, instruments and markets and ideas about finance concepts and problems at an introductory level; be aware of, at an introductory level, different ways of thinking about and analysing financial phenomena; and, reflecting the principles of how we approach Finance at Essex Business School, you’ll gain an appreciation of the role that finance plays in society as whole.
Introduction to Management is a broad-ranging module intended to provide a foundation in the most significant issues in management theory and practice, as well as to prepare you for related modules in subsequent years of your course. Because theoretical explanations, i.e. academic interpretations of what managers do and even of what they say they do, and what managers actually do in real organisations on a day-to-day basis, may differ, we will also draw out some of the connections and disjunctures between management theory and management practice. Our teaching also emphasises the ethics of managing and how to balance the bottom line of the business with the organisation's wider responsibilities to society and other stakeholders. The module also looks to explore how AI is being employed by managers and how this is changing the roles and responsibilities of the managers across sectors whilst also creating new risks and challenges.
This is a key module across all our finance courses. This Professional and Academic Development (Finance) module is a foundation in core academic skill requirements with the intention of improving the standard of your academic work across all first-year modules. This module also introduces you to the themes of career planning, employability skills, and awareness of career pathways. The primary aim of this module is to deliver a range of study skills and introduce professional development at the start of Essex Business School students' undergraduate courses.
How do consumers make decisions? Or firms conduct different market strategies? What impact does government policy have on inflation? Or unemployment? Develop your knowledge of economics in relation to a range of contemporary issues. Learn how to apply both micro and macroeconomic principles to the analysis of such problems.
This module develops advanced financial reporting skills, focusing on the preparation and analysis of complex financial statements. You’ll gain practical experience in areas such as cash flow reporting, consolidated accounts and taxation, while exploring key topics including business combinations, investments and post-reporting events. Blending theory with real-world practice and industry insight, the module prepares you for senior professional roles in accounting and finance.
Develop the advanced financial reporting skills demanded by today’s accounting and finance professionals. This module focuses on preparing and analysing complex financial statements, covering areas such as cash flows, consolidated accounts, taxation and business combinations. By combining theory with real-world insight, it prepares you for senior professional and strategic roles in the field.
Explore how financial theory can aid financial decision-making in corporations. You discover how to apply the value maximization principle to corporate decisions, such as investment decision, borrowing decisions, and dividend decisions.
What is the appropriate measure of risk for a particular security? How might an investor decide on the weightings of different assets in his/her portfolio? How can we identify mispriced stocks? Should you invest your savings in an actively managed fund or in a passive fund? You consider the main theories of risk and return and explore the implications of these theories for investors' decisions.
This module introduces students to quantitative methods that can be used to empirically analyse some of the theories introduced during other finance modules on their programmes, including asset pricing, portfolio analysis and corporate finance. With extensive use of appropriate quantitative software (EViews) students will be able to use real data to analyse financial models. An important component of the module involves using classical statistical concepts to test hypotheses relating to financial models.
Explore the links between money, financial intermediaries, financial markets and the policies that affect them. In particular, you examine the effects of monetary policy on financial markets and on the economy as a whole. Gain an understanding of how interest rates, money supply and central bank actions affect the decisions of economic agents, financial markets and prices.
The purpose of this module is to introduce you to the principles of alternative investments. We provide a detailed analysis of various classes of alternative investments in the financial markets. Specifically, these classes include commodities, hedge funds, mutual funds, private equity/venture capital and real estate investment trusts (REITS). The theoretical part of the module aims at deepening your understanding of each given investment category, while the practical part focuses on formulating and implementing various active and passive investment strategies, as well as quantifying the risks associated with them.
Master the necessary skills to conduct econometric research. You consider the Ordinary Least Squares (OLS) method and time series analysis, the conditions under which OLS is employable, the pitfalls and caveats when using OLS and performing analyses on time series data using any estimation method, and prediction and forecasting.
In this module you study the derivative market, in particular, futures and options markets. You explore various futures markets including the stock index, FX, commodities and interest rate contracts, how they are priced and hedged, and different trading strategies; as well as considering different option positions, the relationship between call and put option prices, and trading strategies.
This module gives you the chance to critically investigate a contemporary financial issue. You put the knowledge gained on your course into practice by undertaking an independent, self-directed project or dissertation that develops your research and employability skills ready for graduate employment.
placement Year
4.3
