LETTER OF MOTIVATION

Hien VU – 850722 4098

I received (was awarded) two silver medals in Ipho (International Physics Olympiad) and
APho (Asian Physics Olympiad) in….. These achievements in Physics from high school
had naturally brought me the thought had brought up my wish of becoming a natural
scientist. However, I truly realized my dream after a nine month intensive English course
later had changed my mind). Learning English) in ADS center, which did not only
effectively improve my shows me the language but also gave me information from on
different perspectives about the current situations of Vietnam and other countries. I
understood The fact that a small country like Vietnam is a small country, which is in the
trend of privatization and globalization would This bring back to Vietnam not only
potential developments opportunities but also challenges. In order to achieve enhance the
potential developments, Vietnam really need desires strong competent economists who
understand the country Vietnamese economy well and hold solid knowledge from
developed countries. I felt that my professional working in economics would will help me
contribute more to the development of my country. I, thus, decided to change my life by
switching my academic study to Economics, especifically Finance.

Based on my successful high school study and good result from the English course, I was
awarded an AUSAID scholarship to study bachelor’s degree at Australian National
University. At first, I had difficulties with in perceiving economic ideas in Economics,
since they are somehow different to from natural science ideas knowledge. However, I
learnt that the economic world can also be seen from the side of natural science angle,
which often convinced me faster help me access the professional knowledge efficiently. I
realized that the capitalism in general and specific areas - such as financial markets -
bearing drawbacks, which open create chances for economists to study and find new
ways to improve them. Carrying that in mind, Therefore, I decided to become an
economist focusing on specialized in Finance to improve the drawbacks. The years
studying the bachelor’s degree in finance at Australian National University together with
my experiences in natural science before have equipped me strong mathematical,
statistical, economic and financial backgrounds. Gradually, I felt in love with the career
of becoming as an economist becomes my life time goal and I decided to continue my
studying in finance after holding a bachelor’s degree in finance this area.

Studying a Master’s degree at Lund University is my the second step toward my goal. I
have studied intensive statistical research methods from Financial Statistics and
Empirical Finance courses. Practical labs have helped me comprehend clearly the
specialized theories behind (?), and become proficient at analyzing and researching
methods. Self-study under the instructions from during the courses has built up the skills
in searching and processing the data, selecting and testing the models, and analyzing the
intuitive theories behind those models. Due to my Possessing strong background and
ability in Mathematics and Statistics, I got the second highest result among students
attending the Empirical Finance course. Furthermore, I have acquired much more
financial practices and theories from Theory of Corporate Finance, Foundation of
Finance, Managerial Finance and Risk Management courses. With the characteristic of
exploring insight of the problems, I usually read carefully lectural notes, text books, and
doing searching further research from reference books, the Internet and academic
publications. My efforts on these Master courses were awarded by 3 VG scores in one
semester.

Besides studying for the master courses, my self-study specializes in valuing options with
different models used for the underlying assets by reading books and related articles from
Journal of Derivative, Journal of Finance. The stochastic processes, from simple
processes as Wiener process to complicated processes ones as Lévy process, and their
applications to finance attract me place much attraction to me. The book ‘Financial
Modeling with Jump Processes’ of Rama Cont and Peter Tankov brought me the
overview and advanced knowledge about the stochastic processes. By applying these
processes for underlying stock, the estimated values of European Options are calculated
basing based on Black-Scholes framework. There is are uncountable numerous number of
researchers working on this fundamental framework with more sophisticated assumptions
and sorts of options, in which Carr et al (2004), Galluccio (2001), Geman (2001) and
Joao (2001) are some of them. At the same time, GARCH and its modifications
efficiently model the behavior of underlying stocks, which also allow measuring values
of Options. The works of Duan (1995), Hauksson (2001) and Badescu (2008) are some in
numerous contributions. My interest is to learn and to compare two these two methods
using current data sets. My effort is attracted by their complication and potential
discovering opportunities.

Outside the Besides academic life, I often actively organize and join social activities such
as raising money for charity (name some of events), tutoring English for poor children,
and bringing economics fundamental to communities lacking knowledge about of
economics. Those activities have given me precious lessons experience about time
management, teaching skills and patience which These experiences have helped me adapt
quickly to new environments and new projects.

Those activities in combination with my academic experience have confirmed my choice

of becoming a researcher. I feel happy with gaining new knowledge, putting efforts
toward discovering something new new things, which would bring benefits for societies,
and transferring sharing knowledge to others. I love a peaceful and meaningful life of a
researcher at an academic universities.
At the present, I am happy to do study master’s degree with the best professors and the
most creative and intelligent colleagues at Lund University. The university is one of the
best universities in one of the richest most prosperous countries in the world. The
facilities and the academic environment at Lund please me all the time always create
good conditions for my research. Moreover, the professors at Lund University are very
kind, experienced, and honorable. My respect and adoration towards the professors have
amplified my desire to become a researcher and a teacher like them. Last but not least
(just in speaking style),Lastly, the city and people here are very nice, and I love the
peaceful life here. Due to In consideration of those reasons and many others that have
not been listed, I have decided to apply for a PhD position at Lund University to pursue
an academic career.