Want to study Finance in University?

Finance is an umbrella term for a wide variety of opportunities in the industry. Some opportunities are in the specialization of Investments, where you create and manage portfolios for your clients. In simple terms, they give you their money and you invest it in investments that reap returns for your clients. These investments can be in securities on a stock exchange like the Johannesburg Stock Exchange or Zimbabwe Stock Exchange, or debt instruments, or commodities such as gold and
platinum, or alternative investments such as property and wine (yes, wine is a good investment). On the other end of the spectrum is Corporate Finance where you manage the financial aspects of a business to ensure that it remains sustainable and profitable for its investors.

I love studying finance simply because it resonates with three things l love most; autonomy, connectedness and numbers. Finance allows me to be flexible in ways that only few degrees can do. I can go into investments and corporate finance simultaneously without breaking any extra sweat. The
skills l get from my degree make room for me in any organisation from any industry because that is how important and pervasive Finance is.Personally, l like to be in corporate finance because it is not
as fast-paced as investments and portfolio management.

My interest in this field stems from watching news channels that report everything that is finance-related. In finance, you get the chance to observe how a decision by an oil supplier in the Middle East result in a wage protest in South Africa. It makes you appreciate how every decision we make has
ripple effects on everyone regardless of borders. I believe my best experiences are yet to come, but for now it would be understanding the 2008 Financial Crisis. This crisis better helped me understand how people defaulting on their mortgages in the US resulted in me standing in a queue to buy bread in Zimbabwe in 2008. Finance is awesome like that.

If you want to get a practical idea of this field while you’re in your high school, l would suggest that you join a society as a finance chair/director for the club. This will give you first-hand experience on a basic level. If you want to go further, then you should keep up to date with the business section of your local newspaper. Make use of the news websites to understand finance better. More often than not, whatever you read in international news is related to something in the business news in your
area. Try to see if you can spot some instances.

There are various institutions that offer finance degrees and funding opportunities for these degrees. Do not be discouraged by your marks, finance is easy to comprehend if you know your numbers. However, it is a lot of work and requires certain values such as honesty, accountability, integrity because people will only trust you with their hard-earned savings if your ethics revolve around these values.