China

The Financial Technology (Fintech) course aims to explore the intersection of finance and technology, enhancing the efficiency and innovation capacity of financial services through the application of emerging technologies. The course covers the following key areas:

1. Overview of Financial Technology
2. Big Data Technology
3. Cloud Computing Technology
4. Blockchain Technology
5. Artificial Intelligence Technology
6. Practical Cases and Applications
7. Practical Skills Development

The course provides a study of modern international finance theories. Topics include foreign exchange rates, international monetary systems, balance of payments, macroeconomic policy in the open economy, and China's foreign exchange rate policies and balance of payments issues. College level algebra and simple calculus is used frequently during lectures. 

The aim of Intensive Chinese Reading is to improve the students' reading and writing skills by learning vocabulary and grammar.

Intermediate Class: For those who have vocabulary skill of more than 1200 Chinese words. The course aims to allow students to use Chinese in daily lives, studies and work.
 

This course will focus on the teaching of two types of Chinese folk dance: Xinjiang dance and long-sleeve dance, including their historical and cultural background as well as the basic moves. Students will practice the basic dance techniques and will learn an excerpt from a performance of each of these two types of dances and rehearse for the performance at the farewell party.

To provide the students with the basic knowledge of Chinese folk dance and to offer them an opportunity to practice the basic moves and present a performance.

Students learn pronunciation, vocabulary, grammar of modern Chinese systematically. It focuses on the training of students’ reading and writing skills in Chinese and consequently improves students’ communication ability. There are three levels for according to the textbooks and teaching pace. In level one, the students learn about 10000 new words and over 500 grammar items. After this course, the students’ language level should be equivalent to the HSK level 11. 

This course helps the students to acquire basic knowledge about bank and fintech business models and risks; understand the functioning of contemporary financial technologies and discuss their merits and flaws; evaluate the impact of digitalization and fintech firm entrants on the banking sector.

This course introduces banks and their business models and discusses how trends in financial technologies affect the banking sector. The course combines academic rigour and literature review with practical insights from case studies, e.g., based on financial statements and industry reports. 

First, we will discuss the role of banks in the financial system and why they exist. We briefly introduce the business model of banks and take a closer look at their balance sheets. We focus on the different aspects of how banks are managed and issues relating to banks’ asset and funding structure and then analyse the various risks they are exposed to, their measurement, and how banks manage these risks. 

Second, regarding FinTech and digital disruption in banking, we will develop a conceptual framework that guides us in thinking about innovation in banking and briefly introduce the financial technologies which enable respective innovation and disruption and the policies around them (e.g., Open Banking/PSD2). We then focus on analysing the business model of new fintech firm entrants competing with incumbent banks and how the use of financial technologies enhances banks’ business models. We will cover fintech lending as a complement or substitute to traditional bank lending. Finally, we peruse applications of distributed ledger technology in banking and financial markets, such as blockchains and smart contract based financial protocols, and discuss how they disrupt traditional financial intermediation processes.

This course provides students with fundamental financial concepts and theories as well as the applications in making corporate financial decisions. Part I introduces basic concepts in finance such as financial assets, opportunity cost, PVs, FVs, and NPVs. Part II demonstrates how to make firm investment decisions based on the calculation of project PV and other criteria. Part III explains why the opportunity cost of capital (the required rate of return, or the discount rate) is determined in the security market, or, the CAPM. Part IV discusses financing decisions, mainly how to financing with debt and equity and decide the optimal capital structure. 

The aim of Spoken Chinese is to enhance the proficiency of oral communication by learning common vocabularies and sentences.

Intermediate Class: For those who have vocabulary skill of more than 1200 Chinese words. The course aims to allow students to use Chinese in daily lives, studies and work.