Canada’s economy is shifting quickly, and RBC is working with a number of universities to deliver microcourses, short, targeted training to help users gain sought-after skills at no cost.
The McGill Personal Finance Essentials course is one of them. Developed in collaboration with McGill University, Western University, and the University of Guelph, RBC Online Microcourses offer Canadians a faster, more accessible path to job-ready learning.
More than 34,000 Quebec households filed for insolvency between June 2024 and May 2025. That’s an increase of almost 5% over the previous year. For Benjamin Croituru, that’s cause for concern. “Everybody makes mistakes financially,” says Croitoru, the academic director of McGill Personal Finance Essentials, a free online financial course. “People face a system that is kind of rigged against them. There’s a lot of marketing that encourages people to spend too much money, to borrow money the wrong way.
McGill software engineering student David Vo began investing in markets when he was just 17 years. Now aged 20, he’s managing a portfolio worth tens of thousands of dollars. Like many in Gen Z, the Bachelor of Commerce student began investing in markets without any formal training. When starting out, one of the most common errors new investors make is overestimating their risk tolerance, McGill Desautels Associate Professor of Finance Benjamin Croituru told LaPresse.
US tariffs are a concern for all Canadians—and companies on both sides of the border stand to lose out. But investors shouldn’t necessarily head for the exits, according to Benjamin Croitoru, an associate professor of finance at McGill Desautels. “Emotion is a bad financial advisor,” Croitoru told Radio-Canada. “It’s a time of great uncertainty, but also a good time to think about how internationally diversified your portfolio is. You don’t want to have all your eggs in one basket.”
The impact of time in finance is decisive, says Benjamin Croitoru, Academic Director of the McGill Personal Finance Essentials course. But people don’t realize how small decisions can make all the difference over time. Getting the timing right when you’re buying or selling stocks is one way that time plays an important role in long-term financial growth.
Post-secondary students are at the cusp of earning professional incomes, making it important for them to begin developing good financial habits, says Benjamin Croitoru on a podcast with Moolala. Croitoru is an Associate Professor of Finance and the Academic Director of the McGill Personal Finance Essentials, a free, online course offered in collaboration with RBC Future Launch and The Globe and Mail.
Across programs and subject areas, the McGill Desautels Faculty of Management recognizes the vital role that research, teaching, service and media engagement play in enriching the student experience and inspiring the next generation of leaders through the annual Faculty Awards. This year we recognize the following outstanding members of our faculty:
Research
Widespread access to higher education is a relatively recent phenomenon. People in Quebec only started attending university in significant numbers in the 1960s. And Quebec’s highly educated workforce has yielded dividends, writes Nicolas Bérubé in La Presse. In 2021, the median household income was up 26% from ten years before. It’s a golden age for earners in Quebec, and with more income comes more money management responsibility. McGill’s free, online Personal Finance Essentials course can help people learn more about managing their money.
The McGill Personal Finance Essentials (MPFE) course helps prepare young Canadians for life, Benjamin Croitoru tells Jessica Moorhouse on the More Money Podcast. Personal finance should be taught in high school, or maybe even junior high, he posits. Finance can seem intimidating to the uninitiated, but personal finance isn’t as complicated as the world of high finance.
In a recent video interview with 24 heures, Benjamin Croitoru, Associate Professor of Finance and Associate Dean of Undergraduate Programs at McGill Desautels, shared valuable insights on navigating financial challenges amidst the economic uncertainties of 2024. Addressing the impact of high inflation and the looming possibility of a recession, Croitoru underscored the importance of avoiding common financial pitfalls.
Tax season is here. In Canada, the RRSP contribution deadline was March 1, and while putting money into a RRSP account can help reduce their tax bill for the year, it’s not the ideal option for everyone. The McGill Personal Financial Essentials course helps people in such situations understand which financial instruments are best suited to their own circumstances. It’s a free online course that is delivered in six modules, and open to all. “The McGill Personal Financial Essentials course assumes no pre-existing knowledge,” said Prof.
Human instinct is not well-suited to making wise investments, says Prof. Benjamin Croitoru in an interview with Global News. Fear of missing out is just one example of this. Following the crowd can lead to bad investments, and the crash of cryptocurrency values in 2022 is only the latest example of this. McGill’s Personal Finance Essentials helps people understand investing – and the common mistakes that people make managing their money.
Everyone should have basic financial knowledge, even if they have not yet accumulated much wealth, according to Benjamin Croitoru, Finance Professor and Associate Dean for Undergraduate Programs at Desautels. The McGill Personal Finance Essentials course is a good place to start, Croitoru told CTV News Edmonton.
Personal finances should be important to everyone, and over the past three years, more than 200,000 people have signed up for McGill’s free Personal Financial Essentials online course. Desautels’ Associate Dean of Undergraduate Programs Benjamin Croitoru spoke with The Just Word podcast about how the course fills an unmet need.
McGill Personal Finance Essentials Director and Desautels Associate Professor Benjamin Croitoru recently sat down with Pierre-Carl Michaud, Director of HEC Montreal’s Retirement and Savings Institute, to discuss the state of personal finances in Canada.
