Finance & Investing
Courses on money: personal finance and pensions, investing and markets, accounting and financial analysis, and the economics underneath them.
Verified courses first, then the rest of the category
A short course on planning for retirement, covering the arithmetic and the decisions rather than recommending products. Free from The Open University, startable without signing up, with a free statement of participation on completion.
Not independently verified
Yale’s account of the 2008 crisis, taught with the benefit of hindsight by people who were studying it as it happened. Useful context for anything else in finance. Delivered through Coursera; the browse listing publishes no price.
Not independently verified
IESE’s specialization on financial leadership, addressed to the decisions a finance chief actually owns. Delivered through Coursera; the browse listing publishes no price.
Not independently verified
Part of Intuit’s bookkeeping sequence, covering how assets and sales are recorded in practice. Delivered through Coursera; the browse listing publishes no price.
Not independently verified
The Indian School of Business on trading strategies in emerging markets, a perspective rarely covered by US or European courses. Delivered through Coursera; the browse listing publishes no price.
Not independently verified
Reading an income statement to judge how a company performed, the performance half of Illinois’ statements pair. Delivered through Coursera; the browse listing publishes no price.
Not independently verified
Reading a balance sheet to judge where a company stands, the position half of the same pair. Delivered through Coursera; the browse listing publishes no price.
Not independently verified
About this subject
Courses about money: household finance and pensions, investing and how markets behave, accounting and financial analysis, and the economics those subjects rest on. Much of this catalogue comes from universities and non-profit publishers rather than from firms selling a financial product, which is worth knowing before you start. Every listing states whether it has been independently verified; most have not.
Guidance
Verification tells you that a course delivers the material it advertises. It cannot tell you whether the approach it teaches is right for your money. These are the things worth checking yourself.
A course can explain how index funds, pensions or company accounts work. It cannot know your income, your debts, your tax position or your timeline, and nothing in this directory is a personal recommendation. Be especially careful with material that moves from explaining a mechanism to telling you what to buy. In many countries giving individual investment advice is a regulated activity, and a course is not a substitute for someone who is authorised to give it.
A university course on portfolio construction and a brokerage course on portfolio construction can cover the same theory with different incentives behind it. Neither is disqualifying, and vendor material is often the best source on that vendor’s own tools. It is simply a fact worth having. Each listing here names the publisher, and where a course is taught around a company’s own product the summary says so.
Tax, pensions and consumer protection are national. A course on retirement accounts, tax-advantaged wrappers or filing obligations may be precise and current and still be about somewhere you do not live. Personal finance courses are the most affected; corporate finance, accounting principles and economics travel much better.
This catalogue spans household budgeting through to graduate corporate finance and quantitative modelling. Someone deciding what to do with a first pension needs something quite different from someone learning to read a balance sheet professionally. The level on each listing is recorded from what the provider states, and the summary usually says who the course is pitched at.
Interest rates, tax rules and pension regulations change, and a course recorded some years ago can be accurate about principles while out of date about numbers. Where a provider publishes a last-updated date we record it. Where they do not, the listing shows only the date we checked the page, which tells you about our research rather than about the course.
Standards
The published standard applies unchanged. These are the checks that tend to matter most in this subject.
A verification says nothing about whether the strategy a course teaches will make or lose you money, and nothing about whether it suits your circumstances. We do not assess investment merit and we never will.
Questions
No. Verified means the course is real and broadly matches what it advertises. It is not a judgement on the financial approach being taught, and it is not financial advice. If you need advice about your own money, speak to someone authorised to give it where you live.
It depends on the subject. Accounting principles, corporate finance and economics travel well. Anything touching tax, pensions or regulated products is usually written for one country, and the listing names the publisher so you can judge.
Universities and non-profit publishers account for much of this part of the catalogue, and they publish openly. Where a course is free to take but charges for a certificate or an exam, the listing says so rather than describing it simply as free.
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