Requirements
Students pursuing the Minor in Finance must complete a set of pre-requisites and a total of five courses, including two core courses and three electives, at level 300 or higher. Students must earn a minimum grade of C+ averaged over the two core courses and three elective courses.
Pre-Requisites
Students can find all pre-requisite information and learn how to apply here.
Core Courses
The two core courses are:
ECO 362: Financial Investments
This course surveys the field of investments with special emphasis on the valuation of financial assets. Issues studied include how portfolios of assets should be formed, how to measure and control risk, how to evaluate investment performance and how to test alternative investment strategies and asset pricing models.
ECO 363: Corporate Finance
This course investigates the financing decisions of companies and financial institutions in the wider context of the workings of financial markets. Topics include capital budgeting, capital structure choice, risk management, liquidity, corporate governance, and the interactions between corporate finance and the workings of financial institutions and markets.
Ideally, the two core courses are to be completed during your junior year–ECO 362 in the Fall and ECO 363 in the Spring. In case of scheduling conflicts, they may be taken out of sequence, or completed earlier (sophomore year) or later (senior year).
Elective Courses
Students must complete three courses chosen from the two lists below. All require a letter grade. Pass/Fail is not allowed.
Courses not listed in the pre-approved lists here, but which form part of a coherent program of study in finance, and which are approved in advance by the Director of Undergraduate Studies, may be used to fulfill the electives requirement. Courses must be at level 300 or higher. Requests must be made by email to the Director of Undergraduate Studies, Yacine Ait-Sahalia.
When you select your elective courses, keep in mind that:
- At least 1 of your 3 elective courses must be selected from List 1; your other 2 elective courses can be selected from either list.
- Out of the five courses (two core and three electives), two at most may be double-counted to fulfill both the requirements of the finance minor and your major.
List 1: Financial Applications
- ECE 473/COS 473: Elements of Decentralized Finance
- ECO 325: Organization and Design of Markets
- ECO 327: Firm Competition and Strategy: A Mathematical Approach
- ECO 342: Money and Banking
- ECO 353: International Monetary Economics
- ECO 361: Financial Accounting
- ECO 416: Fintech
- ECO 461: Entrepreneurial Finance, Private Equity and Venture Capital
- ECO 462: Portfolio Theory and Asset Management
- ECO 463: International Financial Markets
- ECO 464: Corporate Restructuring
- ECO 466: Fixed Income, Options & Derivatives, Models & Applications
- ECO 467: Institutional Finance: Trading and Markets
- ECO 468: Behavioral Finance
- ECO 469: Valuation and Security Analysis
- ECO 491: Cases in Financial Risk Management
- ECO 492: Asian Capital Markets
- ECO 493: Financial Crises
- ECO 494: Chinese Financial and Monetary Systems
- EGR 395: Venture Capital and Finance of Innovation
- EGR 475: Building and Operating Complex and Regulated Ventures
- EGR 491: High-Tech Entrepreneurship
- ORF 311: Stochastic Optimization and Machine Learning in Finance
- ORF 335: Introduction to Financial Mathematics
- ORF 435: Financial Risk Management
- ORF445: High Frequency Markets: Models and Data Analysis
- SPI 466: Financial History
- SPI 524: The Political Economy of Central Banking
- SPI 582f: House of Debt: Understanding Macro & Financial Policy
List 2: Methodology for Finance
- COS 324: Introduction to Machine Learning
- COS 333: Advanced Programming Techniques
- COS 424: Fundamentals of Machine Learning
- COS 432: Information Security
- COS 436: Human-Computer Interface Technology
- COS 445: Economics and Computing
- COS 448: Innovating Across Technology, Business, and Marketplaces
- ECE 364: Machine Learning for Predictive Data Analytics
- ECE 435: Machine Learning and Pattern Recognition
- ECO 311: Macroeconomics: A Mathematical Approach
- ECO 312: Econometrics: A Mathematical Approach
- ECO 313: Econometric Applications
- ECO 316: Economic Lessons from the World of Sports
- ECO 317: The Economics of Uncertainty
- ECO 322: Econometric Tools for Research in Microeconomics
- ECO 323: Market Failures and Policy Responses
- ECO 365: Introduction to Empirical Methodology in Finance
- ECO 414: Introduction to Economic Dynamics
- ECO 418: Strategy and Information
- ECO 488: Applied Game Theory
- MAT 385: Probability Theory
- MAT 486: Random Processes
- ORF 307: Optimization
- ORF 309: Probability and Stochastic Systems
- ORF 350: Analysis of Big Data
- ORF 363: Computing and Optimization for the Physical and Social Sciences
- ORF 401: Electric Commerce
- ORF 405: Regression and Applied Time Series
- ORF 409: Introduction to Monte Carlo Simulation
- ORF 455: Energy and Commodities Markets
- POL337: Business Influence in American Politics
- SPI 340: Psychology of Decision Making
Study Abroad & Earn Credit Toward Your Minor
At most, students may use one course completed abroad to fulfill one minor elective or pre-requisite requirement. The study abroad approval forms must be signed prior to your departure by the Minor in Finance DUS. After your return, the course grade will be posted to your record by the Study Abroad Office for the Minor. We only accept regular semester courses (no summer session or online courses) that are deemed equivalent to a Princeton course. The two core courses must be completed at Princeton, there are no substitutions for these courses.