Key information
This master's degree is designed to enhance your employment potential across international banking, accounting, and finance functions of multinational organisations.
- Level
- Postgraduate Taught
- Delivery type
- Full Time, Part Time
- Degree qualification
- MSc
- Mode of delivery
- On-Campus
- Duration
- 1 year
- Location
- Edinburgh
- Start date
- September, January
Our MSc International Accountancy and Finance degree will equip you with highly employable expertise, and a thorough understanding of global financial issues. You’ll learn the academic theory and professional application necessary to set you up for life after graduation. By gaining widespread knowledge across the discipline, the programme will allow you to pursue professional and managerial careers in international accounting and finance, both in the private and public sectors.
You’ll develop a systematic understanding of international accounting and finance and acquire a critical awareness of contemporary issues in professional practice, and the academic discipline. You’ll understand the way the environment affects accounting and causes international differences, and how financial decisions or questions are analysed or modelled in theory. You’ll analyse and understand a wide range of real-life contexts, including the way financial markets and institutions operate, how much a company decides to borrow, and how investors select portfolios of assets.
You’ll learn about, and evaluate, a comprehensive range of research techniques used in international accounting and finance and understand how such techniques create and interpret knowledge. This will allow you to critically evaluate academic research, professional research and pronouncements, and financial media articles. These research and critical analysis skills will enable you to carry out an original research project on your chosen topic.
The career-focused master’s programme will develop your transferrable skills, including teamwork, communication, and presentation to make you highly sought after upon graduation. You’ll gain the skills and knowledge to help you thrive in the accountancy and financial services sector, in academic research, or in your chosen employment sector. The strong international relevance of this programme will make your skillset highly transferable across the globe. The MSc is accredited and approved by several accountancy bodies, providing you with the necessary accreditation for those looking to gain professional qualifications from the key accounting associations.
Your student experience
Your learning will be informed by the expertise of our research-active academics whose work covers four key areas:
- Employment, Work and the Professions
- Logistics and Sustainability
- Networks and Enterprise Excellence
- Social and Economic Data Analysis
Go Global
With Go Global, Heriot-Watt's global student programme, you can carry your studies to new places and experience new cultures, expanding your horizons on the way. You'll discover what it means to be a true global citizen and emerge prepared for wherever your career journey will take you.
Inter-Campus Transfer: Dubai
Course content
September Intake - Edinburgh
Mandatory September
- Corporate Finance
- Financial Analysis
- International Accounting Standards
Optional September
- Corporate Governance and Sustainability
- Capital Markets
- Taxation
Mandatory January
- Research Philosophy and Practice
- International Managerial Accounting
- International Accounting Theory
Optional January
- Auditing, Assurance and Professional Ethics
- Emerging Financial Markets
- Comparative Financial Reporting
- Empirical Financial Modelling
Mandatory May
- Accounting, Banking or Finance Dissertation
January Intake - Edinburgh
Mandatory January
- International Managerial Accounting
- International Accounting Theory
- International Accounting Standards
Optional January
- Auditing, Assurance and Professional Ethics
- Empirical Financial Modelling
- Emerging Financial Markets
- Comparative Financial Reporting
Mandatory September
- Research Philosophy and Practice
- Financial Analysis
- Corporate Finance
Optional September
- Corporate Governance and Sustainability
- Taxation
- Capital Markets
Mandatory Second January
- Accounting, Banking or Finance Dissertation
Programme Video
International Accounting and Finance
Fees and funding
| Status | Full Time | Part Time |
|---|---|---|
| UK | £10,528 | £5,264 |
| International | £21,192 | £10,596 |
- Status: Your residency status is usually defined as the country where you have been ordinarily resident for the three years before the start of your course.
- International: 'International' includes applicants from European Union countries who do not hold Pre-Settled or Settled status in UK. (This does not include students from the Republic of Ireland - see above).
Scholarships and bursaries
Postgraduate scholarships and bursaries
We aim to encourage well-qualified, ambitious students to study with us and we offer a wide variety of scholarships and bursaries to achieve this. Over £6 million worth of opportunities are available in fee and stipend scholarships, and more than 400 students benefit from this support.
Entry requirements
We have standard entry requirements for all of our courses that you will have to meet.
A minimum of honours degree at 2:2 or non-UK equivalent in a relevant subject such as Economics, Accountancy, Finance, Business Management, or an unrelated degree demonstrating numerical ability.
We welcome applications from international students and accept qualifications from around the world. Please refer to the entry requirements for your country for more details.
Why Heriot-Watt
We're the top university in Scotland for graduate outcomes which means that more of our graduates are employed or in postgraduate education than any other institution in the country and we ranked 5th in the UK.
We're also rated number one in the UK for CEO or MD roles, meaning more of our graduates go on to become CEOs or MDs than any other university in the whole of the UK. On top of that, we have beautiful campuses, across the globe, so you'll get a truly international education. Our Edinburgh Campus is home to Oriam, Scotland's National Sports Performance Centre combined with plenty of wellbeing resources, prioritising fitness and mental health for all students. Our Global Research Institutes look at solving real world issues such as climate change and saving our oceans as well as working on the next medical technological breakthrough and the future of AI and robots.
Student life
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