Understanding Master’s in Financial Engineering

In an era that is experiencing some of the major transformations in almost every field, there has been a substantial increase in the range of options available in almost all choices that a person makes. In today's scenario, if any student wishes to access the most interesting jobs in finance, he or she can look for options other than spending hundreds of thousands of dollars for an MBA and can look for options like a master's in financial engineering. As banks are driven more towards the idea of application of data sciences, the relevance of the qualification is becoming increasingly pertinent. The belief that applied mathematics and data science help in providing an edge over others in trading, risk management, and corporate finance are becoming more common.

Explaining Master's in Financial Engineering

Financial engineering is a more recent addition to the quant finance line-up that boasts of being a multidisciplinary field. The students who wish to pursue their MSc in Singapore are becoming more aware of this option that is designed for students who wish to learn to apply their engineering methodologies and quantitative methods in solving the financial problems. This postgraduate degree is optimal for those who wish to treat finances and all entails of it are saving, investing, borrowing, lending, or managing risks as hard science. The skills so learned prove to be useful across various industries such as investment banks, hedge funds, insurance companies, and regulatory agencies. These skills are also useful in data analytics and fraud detection.

Topics of Study in Masters

Most aspirants of master’s in financial engineering fail to find details about their topics of study in the course as there is no standard curriculum. But all programs cover the advanced concepts of mathematics, computing, and finance. These are covered in subjects like computation methods in finance, the derivatives, financial risk management, methods and theories of modelling, quantitative finance and time series analysis, and forecasting. The completion of these basic concepts is followed by options that can veer off in extremely different directions. These include specialization in areas such as asset management, computation and programming, computational finance and trading systems, and machine learning for financial engineering.

Making the Choice of Study

Choosing the right direction is a matter of understanding the interest of students and the career goals in the mind. Some students are fascinated by theories underlying current market performance and the use of complicated mathematical techniques to predict future performance. Such students should look for highly theoretical programs. There are some other students who wish to seek a career in the business and banking sector. It is better for such students to look for programs that focus on the practical application of the study in the real world. This decision of choosing the right program depends upon where the student wishes to be working in the next five years of his or her career. The prediction about how the career will look like can be learned by checking career placement data available on the websites for programs of master’s in financial engineering.

Expected Income

Though salary should not be necessary at the top of the mind while choosing a master's in financial engineering, it is worth taking a note that graduates in financial engineering potentially make more money while the work is done and efforts undertaken are lucrative. Even though the experience is very important, a master's degree is also critical if a professional wishes to move up the ladder in finance. Considering the fact that money might not be the ideal motivator, there is no one who wishes to not make money and with the heavy pay packages that are offered to professionals holding a master’s degree in financial engineering, it becomes an easy decision to choose this career over many other options available.