Business Finance and Economics with a Placement Year

Business finance and economics together form a powerful lens through which to understand how organisations operate and how markets, institutions, and policies shape the wider economy. Finance examines how firms raise capital, manage risk, and make investment decisions, while economics provides the theoretical and empirical tools to analyse behaviour at every scale from individual consumers to global markets. Studied together, they give you both the technical rigour of financial analysis and the broader contextual thinking that economics demands.

At the University of East Anglia, this four-year, full-time degree integrates placement year experience directly into the programme, meaning you will spend a substantial period working within a real organisation before completing your final year of study. That placement is a significant feature of the degree: it allows you to see how the concepts you have studied operate in practice, to develop professional skills and networks, and to return to your final year with a more grounded and critical perspective. Across the programme you will study financial accounting and reporting, corporate finance, microeconomic and macroeconomic theory, quantitative methods, and the relationship between financial markets and economic conditions.

You will learn to analyse financial statements, to apply economic models to real-world questions, and to think carefully about the assumptions that underpin both disciplines. A typical entry tariff of 120 UCAS points reflects a programme with clear academic expectations.

The combination of business finance and economics develops both numerical confidence and analytical breadth. You will become skilled at working with data, constructing arguments from evidence, and communicating complex ideas in clear, structured writing.

Graduates move into roles in investment banking, corporate finance, financial analysis, economic consultancy, the civil service, and the treasury functions of large organisations. Others progress to postgraduate study in finance, economics, or management, with the academic foundation to pursue research-level qualifications.