Università degli Studi di Roma "Tor Vergata"

The course introduces students to the main concepts and tools for the empirical analysis of economic data. The focus will be on understanding the potential and the limits of the statistical analysis of economic issues rather than on formal aspects. Students will learn to apply various techniques using the econometric package Gretl.

Upon completing Fundamentals of Finance, the student will:
• understand the role and activity of a financial manager,
• be able to explain and apply the concept of NPV , DCF and IRR,
• be able to explain the concept of risk in financial markets applied to discount rates,
• be able to explain and calculate company cash flow at various levels (Operational Cash Flow, Free Cash Flow, Change in Cash) using company financial statements (Profit & Loss and Balance Sheets),
• be able to illustrate the main themes regarding financing to companies and understand the Debt/Equity structure,
• be able to evaluate simple and complex investments with the instruments of financial theory.

The course aims at illustrating how to use economic theory to study how how markets works, ad how managers, policy makers or individual workers or consumers should take market decisions.
The course places great emphasis on theoretical ideas and tools derived from industrial organization, transaction cost theory, game theory, contract theory, and behavioral economics.
It makes an extensive use of real-world business examples to illustrate how to use economic theory in the analysis of markets and in business decision-making. To illustrate important economic concepts, we use graphs and calculations based on actual markets and real data. For instance, students learn the basic model of supply and demand using estimated supply and demand curves for real goods, and they practice estimating demand curves using real data; also, they derive cost curves from actual estimated production functions, and analyse oligopoly strategies using estimated demand curves and cost and profit data from the real-world rivalries

Knowledge and Understanding
Detailed understanding of the principles of public spending and taxation, and the implications, in terms of efficiency and equity, of the policies implemented by governments in these areas, with particular reference to the principles that should inform the public provision of private goods such as health, education, old age pensions and subsidies for the poor (welfare). It is expected that the students will learn an analytical and approach to the economic issues. This will help strengthen and extend the knowledge gained during the first cycle of courses and make students able to develop and/or implement original ideas, potentially with original research in mind.
Applying Knowledge and Understanding:
The notions, concepts and theoretical models learned can help students understand more clearly and organically the implications of government policies, and to assess the consequences of specific proposals.
Making Judgements:
The lessons learned can be used to evaluate critically, constructively and without bias the work of national and European policy makers
Communication Skills:
The ability to select and present facts and complex mechanisms in a rigorous manner; to present complex subjects in a simple manner, communicating their findings and knowledge and their rationale, to specialist and non-specialist
Learning Skills:
The course aims to provide students with the fundamental knowledge to follow the theoretical and empirical debate in public economics and in the process of the formation of policy.

The course aims at illustrating how to use economic theory to study how how markets works, ad how managers, policy makers or individual workers or consumers should take market decisions.
The course places great emphasis on theoretical ideas and tools derived from industrial organization, transaction cost theory, game theory, contract theory, and behavioral economics.
It makes an extensive use of real-world business examples to illustrate how to use economic theory in the analysis of markets and in business decision-making. To illustrate important economic concepts, we use graphs and calculations based on actual markets and real data. For instance, students learn the basic model of supply and demand using estimated supply and demand curves for real goods, and they practice estimating demand curves using real data; also, they derive cost curves from actual estimated production functions, and analyse oligopoly strategies using estimated demand curves and cost and profit data from the real-world rivalries

The course introduces students to applied empirical works. The focus will be mainly on applications, while theory is used only as needed to understand the whys of the methods. Students will learn to apply statistical techniques using the statistical package Stata (but also Matlab, R, or other packages can be used).