Accounting | London Business School

Teaching and research that are nothing short of exceptional

Excellence and rigour. Cutting-edge research. Faculty who are leaders in their field.

Unsurpassed research excellence
Put your accounting knowledge into practice

We are a world-class research facility
Accounting faculty carry out innovative research on a breadth of topics in financial accounting, managerial accounting, and corporate finance
We continue to shape the future of accounting practice through active collaboration with the corporate world.

Explore how managers use financial accounting information to communicate effectively with investors
Find out how to use managerial accounting information to make better, more effective decisions
Learn from and work with published faculty who feature on the editorial boards of the foremost accounting, finance and economics titles
Equip yourself with the skills to create impact in our fast-paced financial world.

Core faculty

Darren Bernard

Assistant Professor of Accounting

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Darren Bernard

Assistant Professor of Accounting

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Experience

Dr. Darren Bernard’s research focuses on the interplay of product market competition and financial reporting decisions. His work examines the effects of product market characteristics on inter-firm information acquisition and the role of financial statement disclosures in facilitating strategic product market and financing behaviours. His research interests extend to several other topics, including the effects of direct stock ownership on dimensions of public company performance and the effects of transparency on the flow of funds in related asset markets.

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Aytekin Ertan

Assistant Professor of Accounting

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Aytekin Ertan

Assistant Professor of Accounting

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Experience

Professor Aytekin Ertan’s research focuses on financial intermediation and debt contracting, specifically, the real effects of financial regulation and banks’ reporting practices. His research has been accepted for publication in top journals, including the Accounting Review and Journal of Accounting Research. Aytekin has taught Executive MBA, MBA, Masters in Finance, and doctoral courses in financial reporting. Prior to academia, he worked as a banker in Turkey.

Dr Ertan teaches Financial Accounting in the Executive MBA programmes.

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Alastair Lawrence

Associate Professor of Accounting

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Alastair Lawrence

Associate Professor of Accounting

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Experience

Dr. Alastair Lawrence is an Associate Professor of Accounting at the London Business School and previously, he was an Associate Professor of Accounting at the University of California at Berkeley.

His research primarily investigates current financial reporting issues and how investors use financial reporting information. Additionally, he studies how investor attention affects market prices.

His work has been published in leading publications such as The Accounting Review, Management Science, and the Journal of Accounting and Economics. He teaches financial statement analysis and investing, and enjoys digging through corporate financial disclosures and reporting announcements for investment decisions.

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Andrew Likierman

Professor of Management Practice in Accounting

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Andrew Likierman

Professor of Management Practice in Accounting

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Experience

Andrew was educated at the University of Vienna and Balliol College Oxford. He is Professor of Management Practice at the London Business School having previously been Professor of Accounting and Financial Control. He has also served in a number of administrative roles, including as Dean from 2009 to 2017. His current research is on the role of judgement in management after he became curious as to why judgement, which is generally highly valued, is not developed or used in management. He has an Honorary Doctorate from the London Business School and from three other universities.

Andrew’s career has included work in the public and private sectors, as well as in professional life.

In the public sector he was a member of the Cabinet Office Central Policy Review Staff and spent a 10-year period as one of the Managing Directors of the UK Treasury and Head of the UK Government Accountancy Service. In this period he led the project which changed the basis of government planning, control and reporting from cash to accruals, for which he was created a Knight in 2001. He has also been a Non-executive Chairman of the National Audit Office, Deputy Chairman of the Tavistock and Portman NHS Trust and a Director of the Bank of England. He has won the Sunday Times award for Non-Executive Director of the year in the public/not for profit sector.

In the private sector Andrew worked as a management accountant with Tootal Ltd, ran a textile plant in Germany and was Managing Director of the overseas division of Qualitex Ltd, with subsidiaries in France, the US and Malta. He has been the non-executive Chairman of the market research firm MORI Ltd, the Economists’ Bookshop Group, the California-based electro-technology company Applied Intellectual Capital plc and a non-executive Director of Barclays Bank plc. He is currently a national independent non-executive director of Times Newspapers Holdings Ltd and a non-executive director of the quoted insurance Lloyds underwriter Beazley plc.

In his professional capacity, Andrew has advised the House of Commons Treasury, Employment, Transport and Social Services Select Committees. He is a past President of the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants (who awarded him their Gold Medal) and was a member of the Financial Reporting Council. He has been a member of a number of official inquiries, including North Sea oil costs, international comparisons of telecoms and posts, and accounting for changing prices. He chaired a government study on professional liability. In the field of corporate governance, he was a member of the “Cadbury Committee” on UK corporate governance, and of the steering committee on oversight and governance of the United Nations.

He lives in London and is married with two children and five grandchildren.

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Scott Richardson

Professor of Management Practice in Accounting

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Scott Richardson

Professor of Management Practice in Accounting

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Experience

Professor Scott Richardson is a researcher and portfolio manager in AQR's Global Alternative Premia group, overseeing research in credit and fixed-income markets. He is also involved with the equity research for the firm's Global Stock Selection group.

Prior to AQR, he was a professor at London Business School, where he still teaches MBA and PhD classes. He has held senior positions at BlackRock (Barclays Global Investors), including head of Europe equity research and head of global credit research, where he oversaw research and investment decisions at BGI for both total return and absolute return products across credit and equity markets. He began his career as an assistant professor at the University of Pennsylvania.

He is an editor of the Review of Accounting Studies and has published extensively in leading academic and practitioner journals. In 2009 he won the Notable Contribution to Accounting award for his work on earnings quality and accruals. Scott earned a BEc with first-class honours from the University of Sydney and a PhD in business administration from the University of Michigan.

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James Ryans

Assistant Professor of Accounting

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James Ryans

Assistant Professor of Accounting

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Experience

Dr James Ryans’ research interests focus on investors' use of financial information; on the effects of government monitoring on firms financial disclosures; and on aspects of mergers and acquisitions, including synergies, deal risk management, government intervention, and the impact of short-sellers and activists. Dr Ryans has published studies in prestigious academic journals such as the Journal of Accounting and Economics, The Accounting Review, and the Review of Accounting Studies. His work has been cited by the New York Times and the Sunday Times, and has been presented to regulators and researchers at the SEC and PCAOB.

In the private sector, Dr Ryans has worked in investments and business development in the insurance industry, and formerly was a consultant at Deloitte & Touche in Toronto. In his professional capacity, Dr Ryans currently serves as an independent director and chair of the audit committee for Virgin Galactic Holdings, the NYSE-listed human spaceflight company.

Dr Ryans is member of the CFA Society of the UK and currently serves the global CFA Institute in various program support roles.

In addition to his research and professional activities, Dr Ryans is an award winning teacher at London Business School, named Best Teacher for the Masters in Management programme in 2017.

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Lakshmanan Shivakumar

Lord David Sainsbury of Turville Professor, Professor of Accounting

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Lakshmanan Shivakumar

Lord David Sainsbury of Turville Professor, Professor of Accounting

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Experience

Professor Lakshmanan Shivakumar is a prolific and influential academic researcher, who has been invited to talk at universities and conferences in over 25 countries. He was formerly the subject area Chair for the Accounting group at London Business School. He has held visiting positions at the University of Chicago Graduate School of Business, the Indian School of Business, the Australian National University and the University of New South Wales, and has been a council member of the American Accounting Association.

His main research interests are in the areas of financial reporting quality, stock-return predictability and macro-accounting. He has published articles in several top-tier accounting and finance journals and is a co-editor of the Review of Accounting Studies and The Accounting Review. His research on financial reporting quality includes an examination of the role of conservatism in financial reporting and earnings management in firms issuing public equity. On stock return predictability, his research has addressed issues relating to the causes of underlying price momentum and post-earnings-announcement drift anomalies. His studies have explained how aggregate corporate profits drive future inflation and how corporate taxes affect macroeconomic growth.

An award-winning teacher, Shivakumar currently teaches courses on Financial Statement Analysis and on Securities Analysis and Financial Modelling. He also consults for bankers and consulting firms on valuation, financial analysis and investment strategies. His research has been presented to regulators and development agencies across the world, including the African Development Bank, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York and the Singapore Stock Exchange.

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Ahmed Tahoun

Associate Professor of Accounting

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Ahmed Tahoun

Associate Professor of Accounting

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Experience

Professor Tahoun is as an Associate Professor at London Business School. Tahoun has been a research scholar at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business and the Wharton School, a faculty member at the London School of Economics, a research fellow at the University of Valencia, and a banker at HSBC. His research tackles important questions in society ranging from the quid-pro-quo relations between politicians and the corporate world, the economic consequences of the Egyptian Revolt, and the global development of securities law in response to corporate scandals during the past 200 years. He has also been engaged in comparative international work on executive compensation, looking for the roots of cross-country differences in pay packages. His current research agenda focuses on measuring a firm’s exposure to political risk and to technology shocks and exploring how this exposure affects firms in capital and factor markets. He has published his research in the Quarterly Journal of Economics, the Review of Financial Studies, the Journal of Financial Economics, the Journal of Accounting Research, the Journal of Accounting and Economics, the Accounting Review and the Review of Finance. The New York Times and the FT have covered his work. He is currently an associate editor at the Journal of Accounting Research. Tahoun has been the recipient of five consecutive grants from the prestigious Institute of New Economic Thinking, he has twice received LBS’s faculty research award, he was granted the Referee of the Year award by the Journal of Accounting Research and was made a member of its editorial board. Tahoun was named as one of the Top 40 Professors under 40. Tahoun received his PhD from MBS and completed his doctoral training courses at the Wharton School and Tilburg University.

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Eli Talmor

Professor of Accounting; Founder, Private Equity at LBS

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Eli Talmor

Professor of Accounting; Founder, Private Equity at LBS

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Experience

Founder of Private Equity at LBS, Professor Eli Talmor is co-author of International Private Equity, broadly considered to be the reference book on the private equity industry. He is frequently invited to deliver keynote speeches to business executives worldwide, testified at the UK Parliament on private equity and advised the UK Prime Minister’s Office.

He served on the London Business School Board of Governors and the advisory board of the African Venture Capital Association. He also practices venture capital and is a serial cornerstone investor with multiple exits.

Before joining the London Business School, he was on the finance faculty at the University of California (UCLA and Irvine), Tel Aviv University and the Wharton School (University of Pennsylvania).

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Irem Tuna

Professor of Accounting; Deputy Dean (Faculty)

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Irem Tuna

Professor of Accounting; Deputy Dean (Faculty)

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Experience

Professor Irem Tuna is a Professor of Accounting at London Business School and teaches classes on Financial Accounting, Corporate Governance, Corporate Communication and Investor Relations to masters and doctoral students, and Financial Statements Analysis for Executive Education. Before joining London Business School, she was on the faculty of the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.

Professor Tuna’s research interests are in firm valuation, earnings quality, corporate governance, and disclosure. She has published work in a variety of journals in her field, including the Review of Accounting Studies, Journal of Accounting Research, Journal of Accounting and Economics, The Accounting Review, and Contemporary Accounting Research. She has served as an editor at The Accounting Review, and is on the editorial boards of the Review of Accounting Studies, Contemporary Accounting Review, Journal of Business Finance & Accounting, and European Accounting Review.

She holds a PhD in Business Administration with a concentration in Accounting from the University of Michigan.

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Florin Vasvari

Professor of Accounting: Chair, Accounting Faculty; Academic Director, Private Equity at LBS

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Florin Vasvari

Professor of Accounting: Chair, Accounting Faculty; Academic Director, Private Equity at LBS

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Experience

Professor Florin Vasvari teaches Distressed Investing and Financial Restructuring, and Private Equity and Venture Capital. He is an expert on the use of accounting information in debt markets and private equity. His debt market research investigates the pricing and the role of accounting information in secondary debt markets. He covers issues on contracting in the syndicated loan market and public debt market, bond analyst and rating agency disclosures, collateralised loan obligations and private debt funds.

His work on private equity includes work on limited partners' private equity allocations, private equity valuation and performance measurement, private equity secondaries and aspects of risk management.

Professor Vasvari is a member of the editorial board of Adveq Research Series, The Accounting Review and Contemporary Accounting Research.

With Eli Talmor he co-authored International Private Equity. The book has been endorsed by leading figures in the private equity industry. His work has also been published in leading academic journals and he has been invited to present at workshops and conferences around the world.

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Events

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Academic research

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Related programmes

Accounting teaching

Accounting faculty teach on the following core courses and electives (as part of our Masters and PhD programmes) and the Executive Education courses listed below.

PhD programme

Active research. Rigorous training in contemporary accounting topics. How far can you take your accounting expertise?

Masters Degrees core courses

A key part of our Masters programmes curriculum.
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Accounting

Accounting

PROGRAMMES WITH THIS CORE COURSE

LBS Sloan Masters in Leadership and Strategy

MBA

CORE COURSE CURRENTLY TAUGHT BY

Andrew Likierman

Florin Vasvari

Ahmed Tahoun

Eli Amir

Accounting Bootcamp

Accounting Bootcamp

PROGRAMMES WITH THIS CORE COURSE

LBS Sloan Masters in Leadership and Strategy

Accounting Pre-programme

Accounting Pre-programme

PROGRAMMES WITH THIS CORE COURSE

Masters in Financial Analysis

Analysis of Financial Statements

Analysis of Financial Statements

PROGRAMMES WITH THIS CORE COURSE

Masters in Financial Analysis

Business and Technical Skills Development

Business and Communication Skills

PROGRAMMES WITH THIS CORE COURSE

Masters in Financial Analysis

Financial Accounting

Financial Accounting

PROGRAMMES WITH THIS CORE COURSE

EMBA-Global Americas & Europe

Executive MBA Dubai

Executive MBA London

Masters in Management

CORE COURSE CURRENTLY TAUGHT BY

Aytekin Ertan

Financial Accounting and Analysis

Financial Accounting & Analysis

PROGRAMMES WITH THIS CORE COURSE

Masters in Finance Full-time

Masters in Finance Part-time

CORE COURSE CURRENTLY TAUGHT BY

Darren Bernard

Financial Planning & Analysis

Managerial Accounting

PROGRAMMES WITH THIS CORE COURSE

EMBA-Global Americas & Europe

Financial Reporting Analytics

Financial Reporting Analytics

PROGRAMMES WITH THIS CORE COURSE

Masters in Analytics and Management

CORE COURSE CURRENTLY TAUGHT BY

James Ryans

Financial Reporting for Today's Economy

Financial Reporting for Today's Economy

PROGRAMMES WITH THIS CORE COURSE

MBA

Introduction to Management Accounting

Managerial Accounting

PROGRAMMES WITH THIS CORE COURSE

Executive MBA London

Masters in Management

CORE COURSE CURRENTLY TAUGHT BY

Andrew Likierman

Francesca Franco

Introduction to Managerial Accounting

Introduction to Management Accounting

PROGRAMMES WITH THIS CORE COURSE

Executive MBA Dubai

CORE COURSE CURRENTLY TAUGHT BY

Francesca Franco

Managerial Accounting

Managerial Accounting

PROGRAMMES WITH THIS CORE COURSE

EMBA-Global Asia

Performance-Driven Strategy Execution

Performance-Driven Strategy Execution

PROGRAMMES WITH THIS CORE COURSE

MBA

CORE COURSE CURRENTLY TAUGHT BY

Ahmed Tahoun

Purpose of Finance

Purpose of Finance

PROGRAMMES WITH THIS CORE COURSE

Masters in Finance Full-time

Masters in Finance Part-time

Securities Valuation and Financial Modelling

Securities & Financial Modelling

PROGRAMMES WITH THIS CORE COURSE

Masters in Financial Analysis

CORE COURSE CURRENTLY TAUGHT BY

Scott Richardson

Lakshmanan Shivakumar
Masters Degrees electives

Optional courses providing a deep dive into specialist areas.
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Advanced Financial Statement Analysis

This course is about evaluating the quality of financial information and using the information to reveal the economics of firms. A significant element in the course is analyzing the financial statements of a major bank. These are core skills for equity and credit analysis, in investments, and investment banking and advisory work. The course is designed for anyone planning a career in which they will have to evaluate or make decisions based on financial data. The course is particularly suitable for financial analysts, bankers, investment bankers, security analysts, institutional investors, and consultants. Students from all programs are welcome as long as they have some accounting background (in addition to the core course).

PROGRAMMES WITH THIS ELECTIVE

Executive MBA Dubai

Executive MBA London

MBA

Masters in Finance Full-time

Masters in Finance Part-time

Masters in Management

ELECTIVE CURRENTLY TAUGHT BY

Eli Amir

Corporate Communication and Investor Relations

Financial communication is what firms use to communicate about the firm, its activities, and its priorities with various stakeholders. Although its primary audience is capital providers and the intermediaries that support these capital providers, employees, customers, and competitors as well as governments are also informed via financial communication. In this course, we will cover various communication channels managers can use to inform its stakeholders and the role of the information intermediaries in the financial communication process. With the advance of new communication channels such as the use of social media by corporations in addition to the continued scrutiny on regular communication channels such as earnings announcements and conference calls, investor relations and corporate communications is an important function.

PROGRAMMES WITH THIS ELECTIVE

Executive MBA Dubai

Executive MBA London

MBA

Masters in Financial Analysis

Masters in Finance Full-time

Masters in Finance Part-time

ELECTIVE CURRENTLY TAUGHT BY

Irem Tuna

Digital Investing

This course will provide a framework for identifying digital companies and assessing their potential values. It will highlight why digital companies are fundamentally different both operationally as well as financially. Students will analyse opportunities for digital companies as well as discuss the significant risks facing such companies. The course will illustrate the key financial reporting considerations of digital investing, and students will learn where to find key financial reporting disclosures for digital companies and how they vary between types of digital companies. Leading executives and analysts will provide their insights into where the digital space is going.

PROGRAMMES WITH THIS ELECTIVE

Executive MBA Dubai

Executive MBA London

EMBA-Global Americas & Europe

EMBA-Global Asia

Masters in Analytics and Management

MBA

Masters in Financial Analysis

Masters in Finance Full-time

Masters in Finance Part-time

Masters in Management

ELECTIVE CURRENTLY TAUGHT BY

Alastair Lawrence

Distressed Investing

Understand this innovative and influential area of corporate finance and private equity activity globally. Assess best practices in the field with reference to case studies, practical examples and lessons learnt. The course draws from The course draws from the experience of senior investment professionals and distressed fund advisors.

PROGRAMMES WITH THIS ELECTIVE

Executive MBA Dubai

Executive MBA London

EMBA-Global Americas & Europe

EMBA-Global Asia

MBA

Masters in Finance Full-time

Masters in Finance Part-time

ELECTIVE CURRENTLY TAUGHT BY

Christopher Hennessy

Alon Avner

Florin Vasvari

Financial Analysis of Mergers, Acq

The course will cover the financial reporting implications of consolidations, joint ventures, leveraged buyouts and recapitalizations, spin-offs, carve-outs, and special purpose entities. The complexity of these issues has resulted in companies pushing the reporting envelope in order to achieve desired financial reporting objectives. We will focus on understanding the link between underlying economic events and the information in financial statements, and on how this link affects our assessment of the firm.

PROGRAMMES WITH THIS ELECTIVE

Executive MBA Dubai

Executive MBA London

EMBA-Global Americas & Europe

EMBA-Global Asia

MBA

Masters in Financial Analysis

Masters in Finance Full-time

Masters in Finance Part-time

Masters in Management

ELECTIVE CURRENTLY TAUGHT BY

Eli Amir

Financial Statement Analysis

The purpose of this course is to provide users with critical skills to analyse public companies' financial statements from the investor's perspective. The course is designed to be extremely practical and current in nature, and is aimed at getting you well on your way to becoming an informed and sceptical user of financial reporting information and in turn, laying the framework for you to become a competent and confident investor. The course will primarily consist of the following three components : i) pre-lecture notes that should be read prior to the class, ii) the lecture slides that will be available at the beginning of the course; and iii) current cases written, also available at the beginning of the course. Most of the cases will be in real-time so that we can simulate making investment decisions without the benefit of hindsight bias, and you can decide whether after our analyses you want to include the stock in your mock portfolio.

PROGRAMMES WITH THIS ELECTIVE

Executive MBA Dubai

Executive MBA London

EMBA-Global Americas & Europe

EMBA-Global Asia

Masters in Analytics and Management

MBA

Masters in Management

ELECTIVE CURRENTLY TAUGHT BY

Alastair Lawrence

Private Equity & Venture Capital

This course covers the main concepts, techniques, instruments and institutions involved in the private equity investment. We present a broad set of deals to gain familiarity with the private equity investment model and the opportunities set. Specific themes include: the structure and strategy of the private equity firm, valuation, financing, deal processing, and harvesting.

PROGRAMMES WITH THIS ELECTIVE

Executive MBA Dubai

Executive MBA London

EMBA-Global Americas & Europe

EMBA-Global Asia

MBA

Masters in Finance Full-time

Masters in Finance Part-time

ELECTIVE CURRENTLY TAUGHT BY

Jim Strang

Christophe Evain

Eric Kump

Eli Talmor

Florin Vasvari

Securities Analysis & Financial Modelling

The course stresses fundamental analysis to isolate value drivers and focuses on a disciplined approach to security analysis and valuation. It does this through the use of financial statements and the development of an analytical framework for understanding business performance and financial structure. The course shows how to use accounting information to produce a full financial model of the firm and how investors and analysts employ the financial model to appraise and value companies. The course covers several alternative methods of valuation and appraisal.

PROGRAMMES WITH THIS ELECTIVE

Executive MBA London

MBA

Masters in Finance Full-time

Masters in Finance Part-time

Masters in Management

ELECTIVE CURRENTLY TAUGHT BY

Scott Richardson

Lakshmanan Shivakumar

Systematic Investing

The focus will be on the valuation of securities that embed credit risk. This includes, but is not limited to, corporate bonds, credit default swaps, credit indices, asset backed securities, emerging hard currency bonds, and capital structure. By the end of the course the students should have a sound understanding of (i) the trading conventions of these securities, (ii) determinants of the returns of the these securities, (iii) the role of fundamental analysis and structural models in identifying mispriced credit securities, and (iv) how risk and transaction costs affect your ability to build a portfolio of credit instruments. In addition to understanding the drivers of returns, risk and trading costs of credit related securities, the students will via 'hands-on' exercises develop investment skills via experiential learning. This course is aimed at individuals looking for a career in active asset management.

PROGRAMMES WITH THIS ELECTIVE

Executive MBA Dubai

Executive MBA London

EMBA-Global Americas & Europe

MBA

Masters in Financial Analysis

Masters in Finance Full-time

Masters in Finance Part-time

Masters in Management

ELECTIVE CURRENTLY TAUGHT BY

Scott Richardson
PhD courses

The first step to academic excellence.
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Accounting PhD Seminar I

PhD Seminar in Accounting 1

Lakshmanan Shivakumar

Darren Bernard

PhD Seminar in Accounting 2

PhD Seminar in Accounting 2

Alastair Lawrence