The Canadian Securities Course

You might wonder where I’ve disappeared to this little while. To make a long story short, I have been studying the Canadian Securities Course. After having written the second portion of the exam yesterday, I can finally take my mind off of something I’ve been focusing on for about 2.5 months. Perhaps as a final tribute to the time spent on this exam, I will discuss some of the features of the exam and the reasons that led me to take it.

What is it?
The Canadian Securities Course (CSC) is a program run by the Canadian Securities Institute (CSI) that provides a brief overview of the Canadian securities industry. Spanning around 600 pages and 23 chapters, it is not a short read. It covers basics of stocks, bonds, investment products and Canadian taxation and discusses topics pertinent to an Investment Advisor.
Testing consists of two exams: the first part dealing with chapters 1-12 and the second part dealing with chapters 13-23. Both exams are multiple choice, 2 hours long, and 100 questions. To pass each section and gain your CSC designation, you must obtain a minimum of 60% on each exam. The course must be finished within 1 year time.

Why take it?
There are many reasons to take it. First, it is a required designation for anyone wishing to sell mutual funds to customers in Canada. Thus it is extremely important for Investment Advisors. Next, I believe it was a great introduction to the industry and provides some of the basic background knowledge needed to begin a career in the finance industry.

My Experience
As a student who has been majoring in Business and Actuarial Science for the past two years, I found the course to be useful. I have been learning topics related to what the CSC covers but I hardly knew all the information taught.

The CSC covers a broad range of topics, but nothing is covered in extreme detail. I think if anyone took a half-year University course on each topic the CSC covers (and understood it), you will know more than enough information to do well on that section.
Some of the mathematical formulas are simplified and often no reasons are provided for the formulas. I personally find it easier to remember formulas when I can see the relationships between the important factors – so it actually made it more difficult for me to remember some formulas.

There is a lot of memorization – from margin levels on margin accounts to industry slang. It is definitely doable - most of the terms you need to remember are quite logically named.
I think the course material could be shortened significantly. A lot of topics can be explained much more concisely than it is currently written. Other topics are not explained very well. Further, there are some mistakes in the course material – although expected with any text, it is still annoying.

How I studied
I basically read half a chapter (or a full chapter if it was around 20 pages) a day and took down important terms and notes. I further simplified these notes to two reference sheets per exam– one with important terms/concepts and the other with important numbers and formulas. In the end, my notes were about 100 pages written + 4 double sided pages of reference sheets.
I still had fun on the weekends and went on vacations during this study period.

I also used an external book as reference for my second exam: Canadian Securities Exam: Fast-Track Study Guide, 2nd Ed. by Sean Cleary. I found it to be less useful since it was a little out of date. It divided the 23 sections into 13 chapters because it was how the CSC was previously organized. Some of the numbers were different (ex. Canadian RESP Grant levels). The practice questions are good, but some are pretty useless for exam-purposes (it tested you on ratios that did not need to be memorized for the exam). There is a 3rd edition that came out recently. I did not read it, but I believe it is updated to match the chapter formatting and content of the exams I just wrote.

Is it useful?
Somewhat. It explained the information more concisely than the CSC text. I’m sure the 3rd edition will be much more useful for someone currently studying the CSC. If you have time, it is a great supplementary text. However you can definitely pass the CSC without reading the Study Guide.

Is the exam hard?
I did not find the exam to be too difficult. I treated the entire process seriously and read every page of the provided text. I would say after doing that, it is on par with the exams that I have received in University in terms of the level of difficulty.

Conclusion
Is the CSC worth the $880 price tag ($960 CAD with a hard copy textbook)? That depends on who you are and where you want to be. If you want to be an Investment Advisor, it is critical to your career. However I personally believe it will help with landing you a job in many finance-related fields.
Passing the exam might not be too hard for the studious individual, but actually understanding all the material is an entirely separate matter. If you take this course to learn, it will take a lot more effort than one who just wants a designation beside his/her name.
It was a good journey down a road well-travelled. And I’m glad it’s a journey that I’ve finished.

For more information on the CSC, please visit: https://www.csi.ca/student/en_ca/courses/csi/csc.xhtml