Historically, application of finance in any corporation has been primarily in cost control, operating budgets, and internal auditing. But today in the age of far-fetched innovations and globalization, the world of finance presents new opportunities and challenges for corporate managers. India has observed unprecedented growth in capital market investments in the past few years along with increased economic globalization and market integration.
In addition to day-to-day liquidity management, today corporate finance deal with Investment Banking, Management Consulting, Investment Management, internal financial decisions which encompass strategizing about a company’s organic and inorganic growth opportunities, capital optimization, dividends and buyback decisions.
Corporate Finance and Financial Risk Management recruits the brightest minds from B Schools
Corporations nowadays are facing several systemic and idiosyncratic risks. These risks can arise on account of numerous market forces like volatile interest rates, exchange rates, and commodity prices, or owing to involvement of counter parties in business transactions amongst others. Every corporation has limited capacity to bear risk. When they approach their potential risk-bearing capacity, one risk comes at the cost of another risk. Therefore, risk management has become one of the key career options for management graduates.
There are plenty of job opportunities in Credit Risk Management, Foreign Exchange Risk Management, and Operational Risk Management. Credit Rating agencies like Credit Suisse, Moody’s, S&P, Fitch and CRISIL, insurance companies, consulting companies like KPMG, E&Y are the major recruiters in the arena of risk management.
Opportunities in Investment Banks and Management consulting
Investment banks recruit graduates from premier business schools, who can demonstrate proven skills in financial modeling and business valuation. Functions of investment banks have now become ubiquitous, ranging from fund raising in domestic and international capital markets to deal structuring for mergers and acquisitions. Investment banks support a range of corporate decisions requiring strategic interventions.
Investment Management corporations, which include mutual fund houses, hedge funds, and private equity firms, often deal with secondary market trading of equity, debt, and derivative securities. They manage investment portfolios worth billions of dollar for high net worth individuals, pension and retirement plans for large corporates, and government and pooled public investments.
Management consulting firms recruit graduates for corporate strategy, market opportunities, and financial analysis.
Is PGDM Finance an Alternative career option for CA / CFA?
Over the years, PGDM with Finance specialization / MBA (Finance) offered by leading business schools have emerged as an alternate career to Chartered Accountancy, Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) and Financial Risk Manager (FRM).
Many B Schools including FORE School, today offer simulation and tools like Thomson Reuters, Bloomberg, Euro Monitor etc. dedicated to assist students get a feel of market place and understand functionalities better and support data backed projects and research.
These management programmes in finance from business school brings together benefits from both the worlds: structured coverage of global finance programmes and the academic rigour of classroom teaching unlike the CA or CFA programmes which is more of class room and text oriented and do not offer experiential learning much.
We at FORE School, have collaborated with a global leader in Finance and Risk Management education – Risk Management Institute (RMI) of National University of Singapore (NUS) – to offer ‘Specialist Diploma in Credit Risk Management’. Apart from the core subjects students today are offered elective courses in finance, a number of augmented core courses from auxiliary management disciplines like Human Resource Management, Marketing Management, Strategic Management, Information Technology, and Operations and Quantitative Techniques, which are considered essential for any corporate aspirant.
