Overview

Blockchain has been one of the most talked-about and misunderstood technologies in finance. This practical, jargon-free course gives finance professionals a clear view of what blockchain is, where it is genuinely transforming settlement, funds and payments today, how to work with blockchain-based tools in practice and how to use it responsibly in a regulated industry. Four short units.

Target Audience

Finance and accounting professionals, from analysts to leaders, in any commercial or regulated finance function. No technical background required.

Learning Objectives

Upon completion, learners will gain a full and clear understanding of:

• What blockchain is and isn’t, in plain language
• Where blockchain is genuinely live in finance today, from settlement to tokenized funds
• How to tell the difference between a real deployment, a pilot and marketing hype
• How to work with blockchain-based tools and payments in practice
• The specific risks and rules that apply to blockchain in a regulated sector
• How to talk about blockchain confidently and realistically with colleagues and clients

Features and Benefits

• Written for complete beginners: practical, jargon-free and easy to follow.
• Current and fact-checked: researched against up-to-date 2026 sources, including the latest case studies and regulation.
• Four short, focused units with gated progression; each unit unlocks once the previous one is passed.
• Light, formative interactions running through every unit (click-to-reveal, quick knowledge checks and estimate-and-reveal sliders), never scored.
• An end-of-unit quiz that finishes with a marking screen showing which answers were right or wrong, with a short explanation for each.
• Easy retakes: a failed quiz drops the learner straight back into freshly shuffled questions, with no need to click through the unit again.
• Optional audio narration on every screen (the learner chooses to listen), plus narrated motion-graphic video introductions, with captions throughout for accessibility.
• Responsive layout, suitable for PC, tablet and mobile.
• SCORM 1.2 conformant (single SCO); reports completion and an averaged score to any compliant LMS.

Course Contents

Unit 1: Blockchain Foundations for Finance

• What a blockchain is and how blocks, hashes and consensus work
• Public blockchains versus the permissioned networks banks actually use
• Smart contracts, tokens, cryptocurrency and stablecoins, sorted out
• Why blockchain and “crypto” are not the same thing

Unit 2: Blockchain Across Finance

• Bank settlement rails (JPMorgan’s Kinexys) and industry infrastructure (Swift, the DTCC)
• Tokenized funds and securities (BlackRock’s BUIDL)
• Stablecoins and central bank digital currencies, including the digital euro’s real status
• The trade finance platforms that shut down and what that teaches us

Unit 3: Working with Blockchain in Practice

• Wallets, private keys and institutional custody
• How bank settlement and tokenized fund transactions actually work
• Compliance tooling for the FATF travel rule
• A practical checklist for working with blockchain tools safely

Unit 4: Using Blockchain Responsibly

• Volatility, security risks and the lessons of the FTX collapse
• Regulation in brief: the EU’s MiCA and the US GENIUS Act
• The tension between an immutable ledger and data privacy rules
• Accountability and separating hype from reality