GISI Securities Course Professional Level study guide
GISI Securities Course Professional Level · Work through your exam, one topic at a time.
The GISI Securities Course Professional Level is an advanced, multiple-choice examination aimed at practitioners who already know the basics of securities markets and want to demonstrate working-level command of regulation, products, analysis and client conduct. Candidates typically include dealer and investment-adviser staff, compliance and risk officers, product and relationship managers, and graduate entrants moving into client-facing or supervisory roles. The GISI Securities Course Professional Level study guide has 9 sections and about 3,656 words.
01Regulatory Framework and Market Structure
The Regulatory Framework and Market Structure domain examines how securities markets are supervised and how orders actually become settled trades. The exam tests your ability to place a fact pattern - a firm, a licence, an order, a disclosure event - inside the right rule, and to explain the consequence of getting it wrong.
426 words, about 2 min02Equity Securities and Equity Markets
The Equity Securities and Equity Markets domain covers what a share actually is, how companies raise and return capital, and how corporate actions change the numbers you must analyse. The exam tests share-class rights, the mechanics of issuance and buybacks, and your ability to adjust prices and ratios for corporate actions.
419 words, about 2 min03Fixed Income Securities and Interest Rate Products
The Fixed Income Securities and Interest Rate Products domain tests pricing, risk measurement, and the instruments used to hedge or take rate exposure. Expect calculations: clean versus dirty price, yield to maturity, duration-based sensitivity, and identification of curve and spread risk.
400 words, about 2 min04Derivatives and Structured Products
The Derivatives and Structured Products domain covers pricing logic, payoff profiles, collateral mechanics and the selling obligations attached to forwards, futures, options, swaps and packaged notes. The exam favours payoff profiles described in words, parity relationships, margin arithmetic and suitability judgement.
439 words, about 2 min05Collective Investment Schemes and Fund Management
The Collective Investment Schemes and Fund Management domain tests fund structures, valuation, fee mechanics and the regulatory duties of the manager. Questions typically ask you to compute NAV or a performance fee, or to identify a conflict or liquidity problem in a scheme.
377 words, about 2 min06Portfolio Management and Asset Allocation
The Portfolio Management and Asset Allocation domain tests how risk and return combine in a portfolio, how allocation decisions are made and judged, and how performance is attributed. Expect quantitative work on portfolio risk, beta and Sharpe ratio, plus qualitative reasoning on investment policy.
380 words, about 2 min07Investment Analysis and Valuation
The Investment Analysis and Valuation domain tests whether you can build a defensible value for a security and challenge someone else's. Expect discounted cash flow arithmetic, multiple selection, ratio analysis and judgement about forecast quality.
370 words, about 2 min08Risk Management and Compliance
The Risk Management and Compliance domain tests whether you can name the risk, measure it sensibly, and describe the controls that keep a firm inside its appetite. Questions mix calculation (VaR, limits, capital) with governance: who owns the risk, who monitors it, and what must be escalated.
415 words, about 2 min09Professional Ethics and Client Conduct
The Professional Ethics and Client Conduct domain tests judgement under pressure. The exam rarely asks for a definition; it presents a situation where a commercial incentive pulls one way and the client interest the other, and asks what you do and why.
430 words, about 2 min