MSc Management and Regulation of Risk

About the MSc programme

This is an interdepartmental programme which is administered through the Department of Finance| and offers the following benefits:

• Teaching by internationally renowned faculty from several departments and with practitioners expert in the area.
• Multi-disciplinary exposure to different approaches to risk, its management and regulation through teaching and your own independent study.
• The possibility of an optional internship at a leading bank to gain hands-on risk management experience.
• An opportunity for students with prior training in diverse disciplines and with a range of professional backgrounds to acquire knowledge on risk management and regulation, and to deepen their competency in a chosen area of specialisation.
• Wide ranging coverage of topics in the area combined with a rigorous, in depth exploration of others.
• Equips students for career opportunities in: consulting, finance and banking, insurance, management, regulation and supervision, public administration.

You will need a degree of at least upper second class standard from a UK university, or its equivalent. We assume that applicants will have some knowledge of mathematics and statistics. Interesting applicants with weak backgrounds in this regard will be required to take an LSE Summer School course. If your degree is not from a UK university, you must submit a GMAT test score with your application. Decisions will not normally be made in the absence of this test result. We generally look for a GMAT score of over 650; exceptionally we will consider a GRE score of over 700. Conditional offers may be made in the absence of a final test score. If you are a graduate from a UK university, you should note that you may be asked to take either a GRE or GMAT test. Applicants from developing countries may be eligible to be considered for one of the Lord Dahrendorf Scholarships (sponsored by Deutsche Bank). For more information, please see the Department of Finance website.

The success of organisations depends upon their ability to operate in the face of risk. The growing awareness of these problems has meant that risk management is now recognised as requiring special skills that are central to the functioning of the organisation.

There is a long tradition of quantifying and measuring certain risks such as life expectancies or accidents. Recently, important advances have been made towards developing similar quantitative tools for newer areas such as financial markets and the environment. At the same time, other social science disciplines have produced important insights into how more complex risks are perceived, and how social organisations can adjust to regulate and share them.

This MSc programme is designed to provide a comprehensive view of risk perception, management and control as encountered in a wide variety of contexts. It addresses such questions as: What are the appropriate ways to measure and assess risk? How does the organisation of enterprises, governments or markets increase or decrease risk? What are the techniques for risk shifting in markets, firms or societies? What are the tools available to managers and regulators for controlling risks?

The design of the programme will allow students with prior training in diverse disciplines and with a range of professional backgrounds to acquire a broad knowledge of risk management and regulation, and to deepen their competency in a chosen area of specialisation.

You will take the core course Management and Regulation of Risk, one full unit equivalent quantitative course, one full unit equivalent qualitative course, and a fourth full unit equivalent course freely chosen.

Course one

• Management and Regulation of Risk

Course two

Choose from the following amounting to one full unit:

(* half unit)

• Valuation and Security Analysis*
• Accounting in the Global Economy*
• Financial Risk Analysis*
• Forecasting Financial Time Series*
• Fixed Income Markets*
• Applied Corporate Finance*
• Corporate Finance and Asset Markets
• Corporate Finance A*
• Quantitative Methods for Finance and Risk Analysis*
• Portfolio Management*
• International Finance* 
• Stochastic Processes*
• Asset Markets A*
• Principles of Decision Sciences*
• Real Estate Finance*

Course three

Choose from the following amounting to one full unit:

• Accountability, Organisation and Risk Management*
• Environmental Regulation: Implementing Policy
• Economic Appraisal and Valuation*  
• Concepts in Environmental Regulation*
• Corporate Governance
• Law of Corporate Finance
• Regulation of Financial Markets
• Corporate and Financial Crime  
• Regulation, Risk and Economic Life 
• The World Trading System*
• Strategy for the Information Economy*
• Issues in Environmental Governance*
• Risk and Governance: A Sociological Approach*

Course four

Other full or half unit courses amounting to one full unit from options above, or others with the approval of the course director.