On June 9, Mountain View, California headquartered Coursera, the world’s largest open online education provider, and the Indian School of Business (ISB), India’s premier global B-school, announced the launch of a new series of four courses called Specialisation on Financial Markets and Investment Strategy. This is the second programme being offered by ISB on Coursera’s MOOCs platform after the course on happiness in November 2014. The importance of sound financial planning and investment management in helping an individual to achieve financial goals can hardly be over emphasised. And yet, studies have shown that individuals commit mistakes on choosing their personal investment portfolios. In 2015, the S&P’s Ratings Services Global Financial Literacy Survey found that close to 76 percent of Indian adults do not adequately understand key financial concepts –lower than the worldwide average of financial literacy.
Speaking on the occasion, Dr. Vaidya Nathan, ISB, said, “In India, direct equity investments account for only 2 per of household savings, which are dominated by other asset classes such as fixed deposits, gold and real estate. Surprisingly, the number has not changed significantly over the last two decades despite the economy going through structural transformation. Therefore, we developed this course with Coursera to address the lack of financial knowledge and educate the average person about financial markets and financial instruments.”
Rick Levin, CEO, Coursera, said, “ISB’s new specialisation will appeal to a mass audience not just in India but to our 19 million plus learners around the world – from aspiring to working professionals in finance to anyone who would like to learn the basics of financial planning for personal or professional use.”
Three premier ISB faculty – Vaidya Nathan, Vikram Kuriyan and Ramabhadran Thirumalai – will teach the four course specialisation which includes Introduction to Financial Markets, Portfolio and Risk Management, Behavioural Investing, and Investment Strategy, Philosophy, Client Management & Current Trends. In order to earn a specialisation certificate, learners are required to complete a final Capstone Project that involves managing assets and securities for a person or a company using portfolio management and behavioral aspects.
The partnership with Coursera puts ISB among the ranks of 140 other top universities and schools such as Stanford University, Yale University, and the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. These institutions have produced more than 1900 online courses and specialisations on Coursera.
Headquartered in Mountain View, California, Coursera is an online education company that offers courses and learning experiences from the world’s top universities and education institutions. For more information, visit www.coursera.org.
With campuses at Mohali and Hyderabad, the Indian School of Business (ISB) is a global Business School offering world-class management education. For details, visit www.isb.edu.
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