The primary course goal is for students to master the logic, intuition and operation of a financial system - money, financial markets (money and capital markets, debt and equity markets, derivatives markets), and financial institutions and intermediaries (the Central Bank, depository institutions, credit unions, pension funds, insurance companies, venture capital firms, investment banks, mutual funds, etc.). In other words, how money/capital change hands between agents over time, directly and through institutions. Material will be both quantitative and qualitative, yet always highly analytical with a focus on active learning - there will be an approximately equal emphasis on solving mathematical finance problems (e.g. bond or option pricing) and on policy analysis (e.g. monetary policy and financial regulation.) Students will not be rewarded for memorizing and regurgitating facts, but rather for demonstrating the ability to reason with difficult problems and situations with which they might not previously be familiar. Prerequisite: Econ ECON 50, ECON 52. Strongly recommended but not required: some familiarity with finance and statistics. Summer session students wishing to enroll who feel they have the appropriate prerequisites from another institution may submit that information, transcript or syllabus that is similar to Econ ECON 52, to econ-undergrad@stanford.edu.
5 units · Letter or Credit/No Credit · GER: WAY-SI
The primary course goal is for students to master the logic, intuition and operation of a financial system - money, financial markets (money and capital markets, debt and equity markets, derivatives markets), and financial institutions and intermediaries (the Central Bank, depository institutions, credit unions, pension funds, insurance companies, venture capital firms, investment banks, mutual funds, etc.). In other words, how money/capital change hands between agents over time, directly and through institutions. Material will be both quantitative and qualitative, yet always highly analytical with a focus on active learning - there will be an approximately equal emphasis on solving mathematical finance problems (e.g. bond or option pricing) and on policy analysis (e.g. monetary policy and financial regulation.) Students will not be rewarded for memorizing and regurgitating facts, but rather for demonstrating the ability to reason with difficult problems and situations with which they might not previously be familiar. Prerequisite: Econ 50, 52. Strongly recommended but not required: some familiarity with finance and statistics. Summer session students wishing to enroll who feel they have the appropriate prerequisites from another institution may submit that information, transcript or syllabus that is similar to Econ 52, to econ-undergrad@stanford.edu.
Offered in Winter 2026 at Stanford University.