Overview
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Gain the skills to manage your investments: analyse portfolio risk and plan your pension, with this free online course.
Syllabus
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- Week1Week 1: Why and how should we invest for the future?
- Introduction
- 1.1 Savings and investments
- 1.1.1 Why should we save and invest?
- 1.1.2 Why are savings and investments important for the economy?
- 1.1.3 Savings and the life course
- 1.2 Savings behaviour in the UK
- 1.2.1 UK household investments (excluding pensions)
- 1.2.2 The UK’s savings ratio
- 1.2.3 How the housing market affects savings activity
- 1.2.4 Savings in an international context
- 1.2.5 Why aren’t we saving and investing more?
- 1.2.6 Investment and retirement planning: the UK experience
- 1.3 Investment planning needs a long-term perspective
- 1.3.1 Retirement: the longest time horizon
- 1.3.2 Investment returns
- 1.3.3 Drivers of returns: what determines the level of interest rates?
- 1.3.4 Real interest rates
- 1.3.5 The benefit to savers of compound interest
- 1.3.6 Case study: whatever happened to UK savings rates?
- 1.4 The drivers of equity markets
- 1.4.1 Oil prices and the financial markets
- 1.4.2 Drivers of share prices: company specific performance
- 1.4.3 Why did the FTSE 100 behave like a rollercoaster in 2016?
- 1.5 Week 1 quiz
- Week 1 round-up
- References
- Acknowledgements
- Week2Week 2: The spectrum of personal investments
- Introduction
- 2.1 Variable rate and fixed rate savings products
- 2.1.1 Spot the highest Annual Equivalent Rate (AER)
- 2.1.2 Savings accounts on offer
- 2.1.3 Why savings rates differ
- 2.1.4 Savings accounts – are there risks?
- 2.2 Investing in shares
- 2.2.1 More on shares
- 2.2.2 When do shares offer good value?
- 2.2.3 Shares – more on when they are good value
- 2.2.4 Share valuation
- 2.2.5 Shares to follow
- 2.3 Bonds (fixed interest investments)
- 2.3.1 Gilts: UK government bonds
- 2.3.2 Gilts and the risk-free yield curve
- 2.3.3 Corporate bonds and their pricing
- 2.3.4 Investment funds
- 2.3.5 Investment funds: alternative risk profiles
- 2.3.6 Investment funds: how to choose between them
- 2.4 Investing in commodities
- 2.4.1 Investing in peer-to-peer products
- 2.4.2 Housing as an investment
- 2.4.3 Buy-to-let
- 2.4.4 What are the risks?
- 2.4.5 Taxation
- 2.4.6 Transaction costs
- 2.4.7 Where to transact and when to seek advice
- 2.4.8 Do I need financial advice or should I go it alone?
- 2.5 Week 2 quiz
- Week 2 round-up
- Further reading
- References
- Acknowledgements
- Week3Week 3: Devising investment strategies – principles and practice
- Introduction
- 3.1 Time horizons and goals
- 3.1.1 Knowing the risks
- 3.1.2 Risk interrelationships
- 3.1.3 Do we really understand our appetite for risk?
- 3.2 Diversifying investments dilutes risk
- 3.2.1 Understanding portfolio theory
- 3.2.2 Applying portfolio theory
- 3.2.3 The relevance of the size of the portfolio
- 3.2.4 Share diversification in practice
- 3.3 Introducing the Capital Asset Pricing Model (CAPM)
- 3.3.1 How fund managers apply CAPM
- 3.3.2 What do we mean by ‘the market’?
- 3.3.3 To track or not to track?
- 3.3.4 Market timing: can you outperform the market?
- 3.4 Understanding the efficient markets hypothesis
- 3.4.1 The random walk prediction
- 3.4.2 Technical analysis: reliable sat-nav or bogus science?
- 3.4.3 Technical analysis: some key features
- 3.4.4 Can investors really beat the market?
- 3.5 Week 3 quiz
- 3.5.1 Monitoring shares, gilts and Bank Rate
- Week 3 round-up
- Further reading
- References
- Acknowledgements
- Week4Week 4: Investment in practice – practices, styles, history and performance
- Introduction
- 4.1 Investor activity – evidence from the industry
- 4.1.1 Age and lifestyling
- 4.1.2 Cultural issues
- 4.1.3 International diversification
- 4.2 Relative returns
- 4.2.1 Alternative measures
- 4.2.2 Analysing a fund’s performance
- 4.2.3 Absolute returns
- 4.2.4 The reporting of performance
- 4.2.5 Assessing a portfolio’s performance
- 4.3 Historic returns from different asset classes
- 4.3.1 Historic returns: proof that the time horizon is crucial
- 4.3.2 Bubbles
- 4.3.3 Google: success story or a bubble yet to burst?
- 4.3.4 Privatisations and demutualisations – easy money?
- 4.3.5 Precipice bonds
- 4.3.6 Precipice bonds – mis-selling or mis-buying?
- 4.4 Supermarkets – low betas but high risk?
- 4.4.1 Different decades, different returns
- 4.5 Week 4 quiz
- Week 4 round-up
- References
- Acknowledgements
- Week5Week 5: Investing for retirement – planning your pension
- Introduction
- 5.1 Investing for a pension
- 5.1.1 How much do you need?
- 5.1.2 State pensions
- 5.1.3 The new flat-rate state pension
- 5.1.4 Understanding the new flat-rate pension
- 5.2 Occupational pensions
- 5.2.1 Workplace pensions
- 5.2.2 Workplace pensions: NEST
- 5.2.3 Personal pensions
- 5.3 Calculating pension income
- 5.3.1 Understanding career average pension schemes
- 5.3.2 Funded and pay-as-you-go pensions
- 5.3.3 Take control
- 5.4 The 2015 pensions revolution: freeing up access to pension pots
- 5.4.1 Learning from the Dutch: collective defined contribution schemes
- 5.4.2 The challenges of the pension revolution
- 5.5 Week 5 quiz
- Week 5 round-up
- References
- Acknowledgements
- Week6Week 6: Investment and human behaviour
- Introduction
- 6.1 Questions answered
- 6.2 Behaviour and risk
- 6.2.1 Risk and the global financial crisis: the great eye-opener
- 6.2.2 Human behaviour in the business environment
- 6.2.3 Risk and the business environment
- 6.3 Bounded rationality
- 6.3.1 Prospect theory
- 6.3.2 Anchoring
- 6.3.3 Overconfidence
- 6.3.4 Emotions and investment decisions
- 6.4 Contagion
- 6.4.1 Herd behaviour
- 6.4.2 Groupthink
- 6.4.3 Understanding behavioural finance: some practical examples
- 6.5 Monitoring shares, gilts and Bank Rate
- 6.6 Your investment management check-list
- 6.7 End-of-course quiz
- End-of-course round-up
- Further reading
- References
- Acknowledgements
