Approved Prep ProviderTrendUp’s preparation program for the CFIA examination. All seven modules taught in full, the five CFIA frameworks, and 200 exam-style questions with worked explanations. The official textbook and your exam registration are included, and you book the exam whenever you are ready.
Prep, textbook and exam registration
Four hours, taken online
Weighted to the exam blueprint
Book it when you are ready, no deadline
No coding at any point
CFIA Direct Complete carries a full money-back guarantee. Finish the three requirements below before your first attempt. If you do not pass, choose between a free retake and a refund of everything you paid.
The platform tracks all three and generates your completion record once they are met. Sit the exam within 12 months of enrolling and send us the record with your result within 30 days of receiving it. The refund covers everything you paid, including installments and any upgrade from Prep only. Applies to Complete enrollments; one claim per candidate.
Most AI certificates aimed at finance teach Python, scikit-learn and the basics of neural networks. Those are useful engineering skills, but they are not the skills an investment committee is asking its members for, and a portfolio manager who finishes one of these courses usually finds it has not helped with the questions that come up at work.
What firms actually need is people who can judge the output. Someone has to decide whether a model's recommendation is sound, push back when it looks wrong, document how it was used, and answer for the decision afterwards. That is a separate skill from building the system, and it has had no formal qualification attached to it.
The timing matters here, because this has already happened. AI tools are embedded in research and portfolio workflows at a lot of firms, usually adopted team by team without much governance around them. Regulators have begun asking firms to explain how AI shaped particular investment decisions, and answering that question properly turns out to be harder than most firms expect.
The CFIA is written for the people already carrying that responsibility, which in practice means portfolio managers, analysts, traders, risk officers, CIOs and wealth managers. It covers the judgment side of AI rather than the engineering, and assumes you understand markets rather than model architectures.
The CFIA is built around the three disciplines every AI-driven investment organization has to master. Very few programs cover all three, and none cover them together.
How AI shapes research, portfolio construction, decision-making and execution across long-only, hedge fund and wealth contexts. What AI outputs actually mean for the decisions you are accountable for.
Foundation models, agent frameworks, design patterns, governance and vendor strategy. The strategic literacy an investment leader needs, without writing a line of code.
The information architecture underneath everything else: market data, research platforms, knowledge systems and signal integrity. Most AI programs skip this entirely.
Everything listed here comes with your enrollment. The course runs in your browser, with nothing to install.
Each module sets out its CFIA frameworks as structured diagrams, here the Signal Integrity Framework and the AI Investment Stack from Module 4.
Every question explains why the answer holds and links back to the lesson that covers it.
Full-length mocks run on the real four-hour clock, with flagging and a navigator, and are scored module by module when you submit.
Each module carries the weight shown here in the examination, so Risk & Governance and Alpha & Research together account for 38% of your final mark.
AI maturity models, organizational design, human-AI teaming, and the investment process in the age of AI.
How LLMs and agents work at the strategic level. Design patterns, RAG, prompt engineering, and the vendor landscape.
Market data architecture, research platforms, knowledge systems, data governance and signal integrity.
AI-assisted fundamental research, quantitative signal generation, portfolio construction, trading and execution.
Model risk management, explainability, the regulatory landscape, governance frameworks and cybersecurity.
Build versus buy frameworks, vendor due diligence, RFP design, and integration architecture for investment platforms.
Business case construction, AI strategy, ethics frameworks, and fiduciary accountability for AI-assisted decisions.
AI tools are already in your research workflow. The CFIA gives you the framework to evaluate what they produce and push back when something is off.
Your firm is making AI-influenced decisions today. Govern that process and answer your board before the question becomes uncomfortable.
Regulators are beginning to ask how AI influenced specific decisions. Manage model risk, document exposure and answer before it becomes a finding.
AI is changing how signals are generated and how orders execute. Evaluate the tools shaping your process and decide deliberately when to trust them.
AI is changing how portfolios are built and what clients expect. Stay ahead of those expectations and the governance questions that follow.
The natural next step for charterholders extending into AI strategy. Same issuer, same standards, the adjacent credential for the AI era.
A short form and secure card payment. No application and no waiting list.
Your login details arrive by email within 24 hours. The course runs in your browser, so there is nothing to install.
Lessons, frameworks and practice questions at your own pace, with your readiness score tracking where the marks are.
Your registration is covered and there is no deadline. Book with the ICFDT once your readiness score says you are there, whether that is in six weeks or six months.
Most candidates take CFIA Direct Complete, which puts the preparation, the textbook and the examination in one enrollment and carries the money-back guarantee. Prep only suits candidates who have already registered with the ICFDT.
Bought separately, the preparation and the examination come to $1,390: $495 for Prep only and $895 from the ICFDT. Complete costs $995, so you save $395 and get the money-back guarantee. Against self-study, the whole preparation program adds $100.
Pay by card in three monthly installments. Your login arrives after the first payment, and your examination registration is issued with the third.
Depending on your country, checkout may also offer Klarna or Affirm, which split the $995 into interest-free installments. The provider approves you and collects the payments.
At $995, it often falls within a manager’s own sign-off limit. We invoice your firm directly or provide a receipt for reimbursement. Download the approval pack.
Most firms set aside a learning budget each year, and anything under $1,000 will often sit within a line manager's own sign-off rather than needing a longer approval process. Your employer can pay us directly, or you can pay and claim it back.
Since the examination is bundled in, there is only one invoice to approve. Nobody has to revisit the budget months later when it is time to actually sit the exam.
Approved Prep Provider
Chartered Financial Intelligence Architect
The designation is awarded by the International Council for Derivative Trading, which sets the curriculum and runs the examination. CFIA Direct is TrendUp’s preparation program for it, approved by the ICFDT.
Your examination registration is included in your enrollment, so there is nothing further to buy and nothing to arrange separately with the ICFDT.
Read the official CFIA credential page at the ICFDTThe preparation platform, the official CFIA textbook and your ICFDT examination registration. There is nothing else to pay at any point. It also carries the money-back guarantee.
The Chartered Financial Intelligence Architect is a designation issued by the International Council for Derivative Trading. It certifies professional judgment about AI in the investment process: how to evaluate AI outputs, govern AI systems, manage the data underneath them, and carry fiduciary accountability for decisions AI has influenced. The examination is 200 multiple-choice questions over four hours, covering seven modules. Full details are on the ICFDT credential page.
The ICFDT sells the textbook and examination together for $895, which suits candidates who are happy working through 201 pages unaided. CFIA Direct is $995 and adds the teaching around it: the seven modules worked through in full, the CFIA frameworks as diagrams you can click through, 200 practice questions with explanations, and timed mock exams that tell you when you are ready. It also comes with a full money-back guarantee, which self-study does not.
Yes. Choose 3 monthly payments of $335 when you enroll. Your login arrives within 24 hours of the first payment, and your ICFDT examination registration is issued once the third payment has cleared. Depending on your country, checkout may also offer Klarna or Affirm, where the provider approves you and collects the installments.
Prep only, at $495. It gives you the full platform without a second textbook or exam registration. If you enroll in Prep only and later decide you want the examination included, you can upgrade to Complete within 60 days for $595, which also adds the money-back guarantee.
Before your first attempt, mark every lesson complete, attempt all 200 practice questions and score 70% or higher on a full 200-question mock. The platform tracks all three and generates a completion record you can save as a PDF. If you then do not pass, email us that record and your result within 30 days of receiving it, and choose a free retake or a full refund of everything you paid, including installments or an upgrade from Prep only. The exam has to be taken within 12 months of enrolling. The guarantee applies to Complete enrollments, one claim per candidate.
No. There is no coding anywhere in the curriculum or the exam, and there are no prerequisites. The CFIA is written for investment professionals, and it assumes you understand markets rather than machine learning. Module 2 teaches how foundation models and agents work at the level a decision-maker needs, not at the level of someone building them.
Within 24 hours. Once your payment goes through, we set up your account on the TrendUp learning site and email your login details. There is no application to review and no waiting list.
Yes, and most do. We invoice your firm directly or provide a receipt for reimbursement, and the approval pack on this page gives your manager or learning team the syllabus, learning objectives and a one-page approval summary. Because the examination is included, your employer approves one figure rather than two, and at $995 it often falls within a manager’s own sign-off limit.
The curriculum is built around roughly 50 to 60 hours of study across the seven modules, and most candidates spread that over eight to twelve weeks alongside full-time work. There are no deadlines, so the pace is yours.
Whenever you are ready. There is no deadline: your registration is already covered, so you book the exam through the ICFDT once your readiness score says you are there. If work gets busy, pause and pick up where you left off. The exam is 200 questions over four hours, taken online with remote proctoring. The money-back guarantee applies to a first attempt within 12 months of enrolling.
It weights your accuracy in each module by that module's share of the exam, and discounts modules you have barely attempted. A high score in a 20% module moves it considerably more than the same score in a 10% module, which is what makes it a usable signal for when to book the exam.
Yes. TrendUp is an ICFDT Approved Prep Provider, meaning the program has been assessed against the CFIA curriculum standards. The ICFDT issues the credential and administers the examination; TrendUp prepares candidates for it.
It does. Same issuer, same standards, and the CFIA is the adjacent credential for the AI era. There is no exemption from any part of the CFIA examination, but CFOA charterholders tend to move through the governance and fiduciary material faster.
$995, or 3 monthly payments of $335, covers the preparation, the official textbook and your examination registration. Your login details arrive within 24 hours of enrolling, and there is no deadline to sit the exam.
Choose your option, add your details, then pay securely by card through Stripe. About two minutes.
By enrolling you agree to be contacted about your CFIA preparation. Complete covers preparation, the official textbook and examination registration. Prep only covers the platform.
Tell us where to send the pack: syllabus, learning objectives, an invoice made out to your firm, and a one-page approval summary for your manager.
We send the documents within one business day. Requesting them does not enroll you and does not commit your firm to anything.