Modules WS 2020/2021

Data Management covers the modern data-management cycle, from the collection of data from diverse sources to the preparation of data for data-driven applications. Students learn how to handle various data formats, how to assess and improve data quality, and how to store and process data using SQL, NoSQL, and Hadoop technologies. The course covers eight primary topics:

  • Modern data-management requirements
  • Database system architecture
  • Diagnosing and handling data quality problems
  • Relational databases (SQL)
  • Hands-on labs with MySQL
  • Concurrency control techniques
  • NoSQL databases (e.g., MongoDB)
  • Apache Hadoop (HDFS, MapReduce)
Ethics Essentials:

  • Theory, Principles, and World-Views
  • The Ethical Leader: Self-Mastery and Ethics, Mind-Sets
  • Corporate Ethics: Shared Values, Professionalism (as part of Standards of Professional Conduct)
  • CFA Institute Code of Ethics and Standards of Professional Conduct
  • GARP Ethics and Code of Conduct


The course in Corporate Governance covers:

  • Role and Responsibility of Owners
  • Practice of Right of Control for Various Actors
  • The Problem of Free Riding
  • Major Investors
  • Conflicts of Interest Between Financiers
  • Conflicts of Interest Between Stakeholders
  • Financial Remuneration of Managers
  • Alternative Designs for Option-Based Remuneration Structures for Managers
  • Role and Responsibility of Institutions (Accounting, State)
  • Corporate Governance in Financial Services Undertakings
  • Optimal Design for Corporate Governance
  • Empirical Investigations of Corporate Governance
  • The role of Risk Management in Corporate Governance
  • Overview on different Forms and Asset Classes of Alternative Investments
  • Chances and Risks of Alternative Investments
  • Alternative Investments in a Portfolio Context
  • Regulation of Alternative Investments
  • Socially Responsible Investments and Impact
  • Alternative Investments and Corporate Governance
This year again, CFA Society Switzerland will be hosting the CFA Institute Research Challenge in Switzerland which is the local competition within the global CFA Institute Research Challenge. We also welcome all other universities and especially universities of applied sciences in Switzerland and Liechtenstein to join the Challenge this year.

The Challenge is an annual competition between teams of students in preparing an investment case consisting of a detailed research report and a presentation of a listed Swiss company. For the coming competition Straumann has been selected. The Swiss company is headquartered in Basel and listed at the Swiss Stock exchange since 1998. Straumann is a global leader in implant, restorative and regenerative dentistry which offers products and services to dentists and dental laboratories in more than 70 countries world-wide.

The students will be supported by industry mentors and will have to present their final results in front of a panel of senior investment professionals. The Challenge provides students with a unique opportunity to gain first-hand experience in the investment world and to interact intensively with investment professionals and CFA charterholders.

01.10.2020:
Kick-off will be in-person, but besides a fallback solution we will also aim for a dial in possibility, but we encourage students to attend if possible. The meeting will be held in Zurich and students have to travel on their own expenses.

12.11.2020:
The interaction with the company will be digital this time, and as usual, students will need to hand in questions.

18.02.2021:
The Swiss Local Final will be held in-person, obviously with a fallback solution. The fallback option is that the teams will be presenting live via Zoom to the jury. Again, students have to cover their own travel expenses.
The course will give you a broad understanding of the Chinese civilization and its relations to the people of the western hemisphere during the last two thousand years.

Students:
  • learn about Chinese history, civilization, religions, economy and politics, including the new policies of President Xi Jinping
  • get to understand the differences in thinking, behavior and action of the Chinese in contrast to the people in the West.
  • learn about the economic relations between China, South East Asia, South Asia, Middle East and Near East and the West along the continental and maritime silk roads. The global East-West-trade is more than 2000 years old.
  • Introduction to International Tax Policy
  • Economic and Legal Principles of National and International Taxation
  • Taxation and Economic Efficiency: Optimal Taxation and Optimal Tax Systems
  • International Taxation in an Integrated and globalised World
  • International Tax Competition and International Tax Cooperation
  • International Tax and Public Finance
  • Global and regional integration of nations: APEC, ASEAN, AU, BRICS, EFTA, EU, Mercosur, NAFTA, UN
  • Global Leadership of developed and developing countries: G20, G7, OECD
  • Introduction to International Tax Standards
  • Economic and Legal Principles of National and International Taxation
  • Institutional Aspects of International Tax Standards: G20, G7, OECD, EU – NGOs
  • G20/OECD: BEPS-Inclusive Framework and Global Forum on Exchange of Tax Information
  • The International and European Fiscal Framework
  • The Regulatory Environment on Taxation: Global and European Tax Standards (G20, G7, OECD, EU)
  • International Tax Principles on International Tax Competition and International Tax Cooperation
  • International Tax Transparency on Tax Compliance: Exchange of Information and Mandatory Disclosure
  • G20/OECD: Base Erosion and Profit Shifting (BEPS), EU: Anti-Tax-Avoidance-Directives, Code-of-Conduct
  • G20/OECD: Introduction of a new World Tax Order with Pillar 1 on Digital Taxation and Pillar 2 with a Global Minimum Taxation.
Life-Cycle View of Personal Finance
Defined Benefit vs. Defined Contribution Plans
Instruments Typically Used in Pension Finance
Models for Integrating Financial Risks with Other Risks like Longevity Risk
  • Financial data: diagnostic tests, pitfalls and remedies when applying statistics to financial time series
  • Univariate time series modeling and forecasting, the concept of stationarity
  • Multivariate time-series models (structural models, vector auto-regressions), multivariate stationarity
  • Modelling and forecasting volatility
  • Multivariate time-series models (structural models, vector auto-regressions), multivariate stationarity
  • General improvement of the English language skillsReading techniquesFormulation of research questionsBuilding up an argumentWriting convincing textsNegotiation skillsEffective communication in presentationsRelationship Building and Networking
Ethics Essentials:

  • Theory, Principles, and World-Views
  • The Ethical Leader: Self-Mastery and Ethics, Mind-Sets
  • Corporate Ethics: Shared Values, Professionalism (as part of Standards of Professional Conduct)
  • CFA Institute Code of Ethics and Standards of Professional Conduct
  • GARP Ethics and Code of Conduct


The course in Corporate Governance covers:

  • Role and Responsibility of Owners
  • Practice of Right of Control for Various Actors
  • The Problem of Free Riding
  • Major Investors
  • Conflicts of Interest Between Financiers
  • Conflicts of Interest Between Stakeholders
  • Financial Remuneration of Managers
  • Alternative Designs for Option-Based Remuneration Structures for Managers
  • Role and Responsibility of Institutions (Accounting, State)
  • Corporate Governance in Financial Services Undertakings
  • Optimal Design for Corporate Governance
  • Empirical Investigations of Corporate Governance
  • The role of Risk Management in Corporate Governance
  • Introduction to financial economics Equilibrium and arbitrage Valuation, state prices, risk-neutral probabilities Expected utility, risk aversion, mean-variance theory Optimal portfolios
  • Introduction to financial marketsInterest rates and bond pricesThe structure of interest ratesMarket efficiencyMonetary policyMoney marketsBond marketsMortgage marketsDerivative markets
  • Global Financial EnvironmentInternational Parity ConditionsForeign Exchange Rate Determination and ForecastingThe Foreign Exchange Market and the Use of Foreign Currency DerivativesForeign Exchange Exposure Financing the Global FirmForeign Investment DecisionsInternational Trade FinanceWorking Capital Management
  • Overview and introduction to different forms of qualitative methods in finance
  • Key concepts of experimental research approaches
  • Experimental methods to test market and trader behavior
Current topics in
  • Basic principles for writing academic texts
  • International Economics
  • Developments in Banking and Finance
  • Innovation Finance
  • Sustainable Finance
  • Systematically identify and exploit opportunities.
  • Market-Pull, Technology-Push and Blue Ocean.
  • Opportunity Recognition as a process.
  • Systematization of business models and components.
  • Analysis and evaluation of business models.
  • Application of big data algorithms to identify new markets and technologies.
  • An Introduction to tidy statistics and programming in RSourcing and downloading Financial Data (e.g. from Refinitiv Datastream and Eikon)Supervised vs. unsupervised learningLinear and multiple regressionsClassification problemsPrincipal components and clustering
Extracurriculare Activities comprise of various activities that are not linked to the Curriculum of the MSc in Banking and Financial Management, which are optional and further support the studying of the Master programme.