Courses totalling 52 credits (max. 10 Semesters) ensure that as a graduate of the Graduate Programme in Economics and Finance (GPEF), you will possess the required in-depth knowledge in your main specialisation.
During the coursework phase students achieve a broad and advanced knowledge of key areas of Economics, Econometrics and Finance, including theoretical and empirical research methodology. During the course phase students must complete compulsory courses, compulsory elective courses and a research proposal.
To help the students with the finance courses, the programme offers a two-week intensive course in mathematics as preparation at the beginning of the Ph.D. studies (applicants without a strong mathematical background may be required to complete this course).
A maximum of four semesters is planned for the coursework phase.
SPECIALISATION: ECONOMICS Students have to take three compulsory, Master level courses. | ||
|---|---|---|
| Course | Lecturer | Semester |
| Advanced Macroeconomics II | Prof. Winfried Königer | Autumn |
| Advanced Microeconomics II | Prof. Alia Gizatulina | Autumn |
| and one of the following: | ||
| Microeconometrics | Prof. Michael Lechner | Spring |
| Time Series Econometrics | Prof. Matthias Fengler | Spring |
| Asset Pricing | Prof. Gan Cao | Spring |
| Financial Volatility | Prof. Francesco Audrino | Spring |
SPECIALISATION: ECONOMETIRCS Students have to take three compulsory, Master level courses. | ||
|---|---|---|
| Course | Lecturer | Semester |
| Microeconometrics | Prof. Michael Lechner | Spring |
| Time Series Econometrics | Prof. Matthias Fengler | Spring |
| and one of the following: | ||
| Advanced Macroeconomics II | Prof. Winfried Königer | Autumn |
| Advanced Microeconomics II | Prof. Alia Gizatulina | Autumn |
| Asset Pricing | Prof. Can Gao | Spring |
| Financial Volatility | Prof. Francesco Audrino | Spring |
| SPECIALISATION: FINANCE Students have to complete four compulsory Ph.D. courses | ||
|---|---|---|
| Course | Lecturer | Semester |
| Econometrics for Finance | Prof. Paul Söderlind | Autumn |
| Microeconomics for Finance | Prof. Michèle Müller-Itten | Autumn |
| Asset Pricing | Prof. Matthias Fengler | Autumn |
| Corporate Finance | Prof. Marc Arnold | Autumn |
| ECONOMETRICS SPECIALISATION | ||||
| Course | Lecturer | Semester | ||
| Causal panel methods (in FS25) | Prof. Scott Cunningham, GP SEPS | Spring 2025 | ||
| Topics in Econometrics and Finance (not in HS24) | Prof. Lyudmila Grigoryeva | Autumn & Spring | ||
| Time Series Methods in Financial Econometrics | Prof. Patrick Gagliardini | Autumn | ||
| Recent Advances in Optimal Policy Design | Prof. David Preinerstorfer | Spring | ||
| (GSERM) Computational Statistics | Prof. Francesco Audrino | Spring | PEF / GSERM* | |
| (GSERM) Causal Machine Learning (in FS25 and again HS26) | Prof. Michael Lechner | Autumn | PEF / GSERM* | |
| Econometric Methods for Social Spillovers and Networks (again in HS26) | Prof. Bryan Graham | Autumn | ||
| ECONOMICS SPECIALISATION | ||
| Course | Lecturer | Semester |
Advanced Public Economics (previously "Designing Redistributive Policies") | Prof. Domink Sachs | Autumn |
| Macroeconomics and Inequality | Prof. Arno Valadarez-Esteban / Prof. Winfried Koeniger | Autumn |
| Political Economics of Development | Prof. Roland Hodler | Spring |
| Empirical Health and Labor Economics (not in HS24) | Prof. Beatrix Eugster | Autumn |
| Quantitative Macroeconomics: a practical approach for all | Prof. Guido Cozzi and Dr. Maria Iordache-Bolboaca | Autumn |
| Topics in Economics | Prof. Bruno Caprettini | Autumn & Spring |
| FINANCE SPECIALISATION | ||
| Course | Lecturer | Semester |
| Behavioral Finance (in FS25) | Prof. Sebastian Ebert, GP SoF | Spring 2025 |
| Empirical Corporate Finance | Prof. Markus Schmid | Spring |
| Topics in Insurance Economics (not in FS24 & FS25) | Prof. Hato Schmeiser | Spring |
| Banking and Contract Economics | Prof. Anastasia Kartasheva and Prof. Steven Ongena (University of Zurich & SFI) | Spring |
| Blockchains and Cryptocurrencies (only in FS24) | Prof. Bruno Biais, Guest Professor SoF FS24 | Spring 2024 |
| Selected Recent Research Directions in Theoretical and Empirical Asset Pricing (only in FS23) | Prof. Fabio Trojani | Spring |
During the course phase students have to hand in a detailed research proposal for their Ph.D. thesis and present it to their thesis committee in a colloquium. In the research proposal, Ph.D. students provide the thesis outline and discuss preliminary results. The research proposal is not graded, but it has to be accepted. Following the acceptance of the research proposal, students are admitted into the research phase. All courses have to be completted and passed. The research phase starts in the term when the research proposal is successfully defended.
In the Ph.D. seminars students present their research papers. They receive feedback from faculty and fellow Ph.D. students. The seminars offer a forum for an active scientific debate.
The finance Ph.D. seminars take place weekly, the schedule can be found here.
The Ph.D. thesis is written in English as a cumulative thesis. It consists of (at least) three articles that represent the quality standards of good international refereed journals. At least one of the articles has to be single-authored by the Ph.D. candidate.
At the end of the research phase, students have to submit the thesis and present it to the members of their Ph.D. Thesis Committee in a pre-defence examination. At this stage the Thesis Committee can ask for changes or corrections to the submitted manuscript. After having successfully passed the pre-defence, the public defence is held. The final version of the thesis is printed according to the HSG regulations.
After the acceptance of the thesis, the dissertation is presented in a public Ph.D. defence which concludes the doctoral studies. Students who successfully had their public defense, are awarded the degree Doctor of Philosophy in Economics and Econometrics or Doctor of Philosophy in Finance from the University of St.Gallen (Ph.D. HSG).