Upon completion of this course, the student should be able to:

1.  Evaluate a balance sheet, income statement, and statement of
cash flows
2.  Build a discounted cash flow (DCF) analysis
3.  Build simple models for financial statement analysis and
forecasting
4.  Create working capital, depreciation, and capital expenditure
schedules
5.  Perform a sensitivity analysis to match expected financial
performance
6.  Price simple options
7.  Develop strategies for creating a reliable financial model

This course requires students to articulate, implement, and
reflect on knowledge learned in this and other core finance
courses through real-world application. The real-world
applications offered, through the lens of financial modeling, are
a core component of almost all finance-related employment. 
Students will be challenged to create and also reflect on the
learning experiences offered.

The course provides a hands-on (CREATIVE) experience in applied
finance.  Emphasis will be on building financial modeling and the
use of real-world data to evaluate the common financial problems
encountered in Corporate Finance and Investment. Students will
draw on the theories they have seen in their Finance classes to
build their own interactive financial model from “scratch” (no
templates) to practice blending accounting, finance, and Excel
skills. In other words, students must develop an original
response using real economic data. Examples of project topics
include, but are not limited to, retirement planning, mortgage
planning, portfolio management, option pricing, and the valuation
of a publicly traded company. The projects reflect skills and the
type of work many will be asked to perform at their workplaces
upon graduation. The faculty member will provide mentorship by
giving feedback for these projects.  

A reflective learning opportunity will also be provided to
students enrolled in this course. Students will be required to
provide peer (student-to-student) review/critique of projects. 
Each student will provide a written reflection to the instructor
based on the critiques of their own project.

Retirement planning
Mortgage re-financing
Graphing in Excel
Cost of equity
Beta
WACC
Cost of debt
Financial forecasting
Project cash flows 
Sales forecasts
Inventory management
Work scheduling
Portfolio optimization 
Financial ratio analysis
Yield curve dynamics
Real options
Binomial option pricing
Project selection methods
Repeatable projects
Interest rate parity 
Monte Carlo simulations