Baltic Dry Index Jumps as Panamax Rates Hit Over 10-Year High – gCaptain

Baltic Dry Index Jumps as Panamax Rates Hit Over 10-Year High – gCaptain: March 17 (Reuters) – The Baltic Exchange’s main sea freight index on Wednesday climbed to a near 1-1/2-year high as panamax rates scaled a more than 10-year peak on China...

US Stock Market Timings

 

US Share Market Time or Trading Hours

The United States has several stock exchanges, but the two major ones are the New York Stock Exchange and NASDAQ. The first one is based in New York’s Wall Street and is the largest stock exchange of the world based on market capitalisation. The NYSE is owned by the Intercontinental Exchange (ICE) which is itself listed on the NYSE.

The second-largest US Stock Market is also the world’s 2nd-largest exchange. It is owned by Nasdaq, Inc. and is located at One Liberty Plaza (formerly known as the US Steel Building) in New York City.

The NYSE was set up in 1792 while the NASDAQ was founded much later in 1971.

Both these stock exchanges abide by the US Stock Market trading hours given below. Note that most of the world’s largest exchanges also follow almost-identical timings.

Timings	NYSE	NASDAQ
Pre-market trading hours	4.00 AM to 9.30 AM (ET)	4.00 AM to 9.30 AM (ET)
Normal trading hours	9.30 AM to 4 PM (ET)	9.30 AM to 4 PM (ET)
After-hours trading	4.00 PM to 8 PM (ET)	4.00 PM to 8 PM (ET)

American stock market time is based on the Eastern Time Zone or ET. This time zone has 2 variables –

• Eastern Standard Time or EST: EST is observed during the autumn and winter months in New York and other cities in the US. It is 5 hours behind the Greenwich Mean Time/Coordinated Universal Time or UTC-5.
• Eastern Daylight Time or EDT: In summer and spring seasons, daylight saving time is observed. EDT is 4 hours behind UTC or UTC-4.

Although there are provisions for early trading, US Stock Market open time like dow jones, nasdaq and nyse opening time always refers to the beginning of normal hours or 9.30 AM on all working days. Trading does not happen on Saturdays and Sundays.

The following table denotes US Stock Market holidays on which no business is conducted plus some days which have truncated working hours.

Exchange holidays & occasions	US Stock Market time
1st of January (New Year’s Day)	NA
20th of January (Martin Luther King, Jr. Day)	NA
17th of February (President’s Day)	NA
10th of April (Good Friday)	NA
25th of May (Memorial Day)	NA
4th of July (Independence Day)	NA
7th of September (Labor Day)	NA
26th of November, (Thanksgiving Day)	From 9.30 AM till 1 PM
24th of December, Christmas Eve	From 9.30 AM till 1 PM
25th of December, Christmas Day	NA

Note – The holidays mentioned are for 2020. They may slightly differ for other years. Ordinarily, if a federal holiday is on any weekend, it is celebrated on the next working day. Thus, Christmas day will be observed on the 26th of December in 2022 since the 25th is a Sunday.

US Stock Market Time in India

Since there are several time zones between the United States and India, the following table will be a handy guide to market watchers.

India’s stock markets open at 9.15 AM and close at 3.30 PM.

Details of other major stock markets have also been incorporated.

Name	Country	Opening time (in IST)	Closing time (in IST)
NYSE	The United States	7 PM	1.30 AM
NASDAQ	The United States	7 PM	1.30 AM
London Stock Exchange	The United Kingdom	1.30 PM	10.00 PM
Hong Kong Stock Exchange	Hong Kong	6.45 AM	1.30 PM
Shanghai Stock Exchange	Shanghai, China	7 AM	12.30 PM
SIX Swiss Exchange	Switzerland	1.30 PM	10.00 PM
Taiwan Stock Exchange	Taiwan	6.30 AM	11 AM
Japan Exchange Group	Japan	5.30 AM	11.30AM

A Few More Facts about US Stock Market Time

There have been deviations from standard working hours of the US share market open time in the past due to various reasons. Some notable instances include –

• Immediately after the terrorist attacks of 11th of September in 2001, NYSE was closed for a record 4 straight sessions. It was a Tuesday. Operations resumed on the 17th of September, a Monday.
• On Monday, 29th of October, 2012, NYSE was closed for 2 days due to the destruction caused by Hurricane Sandy. This storm ultimately caused damages in excess of USD 70 billion – not just in the US but also in other countries.
• The NYSE has proposed to move its operations online temporarily due to the Covid-19 pandemic which is in its third wave in the country.

Once the situation normalises, it is expected that all major stock exchanges in America will resume normal operations. Currently, the US Stock Market time remain unchanged. With the US Presidential elections 2020 coming to an end, it remains to be seen if the new President tinkers with these long-standing schedules.

If Bitcoin Creator Satoshi Nakamoto Is Alive, He's Sitting On One Of The Largest Personal Fortunes On The Planet

 In case you hadn't heard, Bitcoin is back in the news in a major way. Bitcoin first peaked in the mainstream back in late 2017 when the price rocketed up to $19,000 in a matter of weeks. The price ebbed and flowed over the next few years, dropping as low as $3,400 in November 2018. In recent months, bitcoin is raging again. It's been on an absolute tear with its value skyrocketing and minting new millionaires and billionaires left, right, and center. As I type this article, the price of a single bitcoin is $48,309. At that level, the mysterious creator of the cryptocurrency is sitting on an absolutely insane fortune. A fortune that is just sitting in an electronic wallet, totally untouched and untapped…

It's generally accepted that a "person" named Satoshi Nakamoto is the creator of bitcoin. Though, it should be noted that he's never been identified officially, spoken publicly or been seen in person. There have been many, many, many attempts at finding him. We're not sure Satoshi Nakamoto exists, or, at least exists as a living, breathing person walking the earth. He might be dead. He might be a she. It may be a pseudonym.

If you put all the mystery aside, we do know two things for certain about Satoshi Nakamoto:

1. He's an incredibly brilliant programmer
2. He's sitting on an extremely enormous personal fortune.

OZAN KOSE/AFP via Getty Images

Bitcoin Origins

The domain name Bitcoin.org was registered in August of 2008. Two months later, someone going by the name of Satoshi Nakamoto published a paper titled "Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System" and submitted it to a cryptography mailing list. This paper is the first time Satoshi Nakamoto's name appeared on the internet related to cryptocurrency.

Nakamoto implemented the bitcoin software on January 3, 2009. On that date, he mined what is now called the "genesis block of bitcoin".

His reward? 50 bitcoins. Today's value? $2.4 million.

One of the most-innovative features of bitcoin is that its total circulation is strictly capped at 21 million "coins". That gives the currency an inherent scarcity which has become very attractive to investors today. As governments of the world print trillions and trillions of dollars of paper money that is not actually backed by any real value, having something that can't ever be diluted is powerful. Not that bitcoin has much real value on its own today. It is essentially a very speculative series of ones and zeroes that 99% of its holders don't actually use to make transactions. That will change.

In its first few months of being online, the price of a single bitcoin was basically zero. Like, literally $0.0008 per BTC. You could have bought all the BTC in existence for $16,800.

In March 2010, when the price was less than $.01, a trader using the username "SmokeTooMuch" held an auction for 10,000 BTC (the symbol for bitcoin). He was seeking $50. No bidders came forward. Had you decided to pay "SmokeTooMuch" his $50, today you would be sitting on $480 million.

In 2011, BTC hit $1 per coin for the first time. It spent much of that year and the next fluctuating between $3 and $12.

In 2013 things started to get interesting. Bitcoin started 2013 at around $15. It ended the year above $800.

Then 2014 was a bit of a retreating year for BTC. The price lagged back down to the $200s.

Here's what happened between 2015 and today:

Satoshi Nakamoto's Untouched Fortune

Those first 50 BTC earned as a reward for mining the "genesis block" were not the only bitcoin Satoshi kept for himself. Quite the contrary, actually!

As the creator and predominant first Bitcoin miner, Satoshi set aside 1 million coins for himself at inception. That's 4.8% of all Bitcoins in circulation. You can see those 1 million coins sitting in his public wallet. They have not been accessed or spent since January 2009. And that's a very strange situation.

As we mentioned previously, bitcoin is trading at around $48,000 per coin. That means Satoshi Nakamoto's wallet is worth =

$48 billion

At $48 billion, by our count of the richest people in the world, Satoshi is currently the 27th richest human being walking the earth.

Satoshi is $4 billion richer than Nike founder Phil Knight. He is $18 billion richer than Steve Jobs' widow Laurene Powell Jobs. He's $4 billion shy of Carlos Slim. He's only about $10 billion shy of the Koch brothers, MacKenzie Scott (Bezos) and Michael Bloomberg.

[We published this article on the night of February 15. For a brief period on the morning of February 16, BTC broke $50,000 for the first time. It has since dropped back down to $49,400 but for those moments when it was at $50,547, Satoshi was worth $50.5 billion…]

Now, isn't it at least a little suspicious and strange that someone would launch bitcoin in January 2009, give themselves 1 million coins, and then never access those coins again (or at least not over the last 11 years)? Especially as the value of bitcoin grew from 6 cents to 25 cents to $10 to $100… and onward. How could he have not sold SOME along the way?

One simple theory that explains why Satoshi Nakamoto's bitcoins haven't been touched in 11 years is that he is dead. More specifically, he likely died not long after creating bitcoin. I mean, how else to explain nearly $50 billion worth of bitcoins sitting there collecting digital dust for more than a decade?

And here's the thing, if Nakamoto is dead, that $50-ish billion is probably lost forever. Bitcoin is inaccessible to anyone who doesn't have the password to the account. Since not a single coin has been sold in 11 years, it stands to reason that Satoshi Nakamoto never told anyone his true identity, so no one would know the password to Nakamoto's private bitcoin wallet. Once the password to the wallet is gone, so are the bitcoins.

Whatever the case, or wherever Satoshi Nakamoto is, we do know this: two years after launching bitcoin, Nakamoto disappeared from the internet. On April 23, 2011, Nakamoto sent bitcoin developer Mike Hearn an email saying: "I've moved on to other things." He wrote that he felt the future of Bitcoin was in good hands. Nakamoto left behind a vast collection of writings, the most influential cryptocurrency ever created, and a mystery for the ages

This Stock Could Be Like Buying Amazon in 1997

 With so much sudden turmoil in the stock market, you may not even realize that you're about to miss an important and rare event in stock market history…

You see, I've stumbled onto a practically unknown (yet publicly traded) company following so closely in Amazon's footsteps that it has seriously caught the attention of David Gardner -- a legendary investor who actually did buy Amazon back in 1997 and racked up over 40,000% gains in the process…

In case you’ve never heard of David Gardner, he’s the co-founder of The Motley Fool.

And simply put, David’s track-record of identifying the right companies at the forefront of technology in the stuff of legend.

In addition to recommending investors get in early on Amazon, David has correctly predicted the success of many of the market’s biggest winners – stocks like:

• Netflix, up 26,756%

• Nvidia, up 3,226%

• Activision Blizzard, up 5,565%

• Priceline.com, up 8,838%

• Marvel, up 9,388%

Now, of course not every single one of David’s stocks has been as successful as these incredible winners…but there’s no need for me to cherry-pick returns…

Because here’s the bottom line:

David has been recommending stocks a few decades now, and his average stock pick has returned a mind-boggling 812.0%... that’s more than 5x the return of the S&P 500.

Which brings me back to the under-the-radar (yet fast-growing) stock David has recommended which has some striking similarities to Amazon back in 1997…

I realize that's a bold statement, so allow me to explain...

First, David first issued his “buy” alert on this stock just five months after a company held its IPO and went public.

Shares of this company had only been available to the public for a few months, and David believed it was the perfect time to make a move on this stock.

Fast-forward a few months later, and David recommended the same IPO company a second time.

Here’s why this is such an important (and rare) move:

In the past 18 years, there have been only 4 occasions David Gardner has recommended shares of a company that held its IPO within 5 months of his “buy” alert.

That’s incredible! Only 4 times has David looked at a brand-new stock and immediately believed he found a winner.

Usually, David likes to wait and see a company prove itself in the public markets for a few years before recommending investors buy shares, but sometimes, on rare occasions, he believes in a company so much, he urges investors to act fast and grab shares.

Perhaps no example better highlights this rare conviction like David’s September 1997 recommendation of Amazon.com. Amazon was a small-cap stock that had just gone public on May 15, 1997, when David Gardner first published his detailed, 4,250 word “buy” report on Amazon’s stock and added shares to his portfolio.

David predicted Jeff Bezos’ vision for Amazon. David told investors “Amazon is about more than just books."

Amazon had been public for just 4 months when David issued this bold “buy” recommendation but boy, did it pay to listen.

A mere two weeks after David recommended buying shares of Amazon, the stock had already surged more than 41%.

Many investors would be elated with a 41% pop and sell out. Not David.

David refused to sell -- fast-forward to today, Amazon’s stock is up over a mind-boggling 40,000% -- turning every $5,000 invested in Amazon into more than $2,000,000 today.

While you can’t go back in time and invest in Amazon alongside David Gardner, I believe I’m offering you the next best thing…

The chance to get in early on this recent-IPO stock.

First, the stock has already crushed the market since it went public.

Second, the company has nearly doubled its paying members over the past four years.

And it has dominant market share, owning four of the five top brands in its space.

Even more exciting, management expects double-digit revenue growth going forward.

That’s the type of growth and market opportunity that gets David and our entire investment team's hearts pumping.

Remember the old saying, “the early bird gets the worm” – an ageless mantra reminding us early movers often have the best chance of success.

That’s exactly why David is recommending investors like you buy shares -- despite the recently volatility in the market due to the coronavirus outbreak.

And while we would never guarantee David's recommendation will produce Amazon-like returns, this stock is already up 1,486% since David first recommended it.

Even though timing isn’t everything, history shows that it can pay to move early on stocks like this one -- especially when you remember David's average pick in Stock Advisor is up 812.0%! (And yes, that includes all his winners and losers!)

There’s just one catch:

David is ONLY sharing the details of the stock with members of The Motley Fool's flagship investing service, Motley Fool Stock Advisor.

Now, if you're not familiar with my Motley Fool Stock Advisor service, this is the award-winning online investing service David created to provide easy-to-follow, monthly stock recommendations to individual investors.

That's right! Each and every month, over 750,000 investors tune in to discover which stocks David and his brother Tom Gardner (the CEO of The Motley Fool) believe investors should be buying shares of today.

Which brings me back to the under-the-radar company David thinks is a rock-solid “buy” in today’s bumpy market…

Because he wants as many investors as possible to potentially profit from this fast-growing company, David published a comprehensive “buy” report inside Stock Advisor that shows you exactly why he believes it has so much upside.

It reveals the reasons why we think every forward-thinking investor should be paying close attention to this alert and what might be a potentially life-changing investment opportunity.

This report is free to you when you sign up for Stock Advisor today.

A Guide to Microsoft Certifications: Types, Impact and Paths

Deciding on a career is only part of the journey. Once you choose to pursue a particular career path, you will need to acquire the necessary skills for that profession. Degrees or certifications can bring you closer to getting the job you want. In this article, we discuss available Microsoft certifications and explain why expanding your knowledge in certain areas of Microsoft can benefit your career.

What is a Microsoft certification?

A Microsoft certification is a credential that shows your knowledge of one of Microsoft’s types of software or programs. Depending on your career path and experience, Microsoft offers a variety of certifications that could be beneficial for you. Many certifications have different levels of expertise, and you may need to earn them in sequential order. Most of these certifications require renewal every few years to ensure you maintain current knowledge of the product. 

Related: The New Graduate’s Guide to Job Search

Easily apply to jobs with an Indeed Resume

Types of Microsoft certifications

Here are the types of Microsoft certifications you can earn:

Microsoft Office Specialist

These global certifications show you have professional-level skills in Microsoft Office suite. There are three levels of certifications within the Microsoft Office Specialist:

• Microsoft Office Specialist: The certifications within this category are the foundation level certifications for the most popular of Microsoft Office, such as Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, Access and Office365.

• Microsoft Office Specialist Expert: The certification covers the middle tier of certifications in Word and Excel. 

• Microsoft Office Specialist Master: This certification shows that you have overall expertise across the Microsoft Office System. To earn this certification, you are required to pass four exams: MOS: Microsoft Office Word 2010 Expert; MOS: Microsoft Office Excel 2010 Expert; MOS: Microsoft Office PowerPoint 2010; and MOS: Outlook 2010, Access 2010, SharePoint 2010 or OneNote 2010.

Microsoft Technology Associate

These certifications demonstrate entry-level skills in the IT field. Some of the certifications you can earn within the Microsoft Technology Associate area include:

• MTA: Database: This certification is for those who want to enter fields like database administration or business intelligence. 

• MTA: Developer: This certification is for those who want to enter roles like software engineer, computer programmer, or web and application developer.

• MTA: IT Infrastructure: This certification is for those thinking about a career in networking, cybersecurity, IT infrastructure management or cloud computing.

Microsoft Certified Solutions Associate

These certifications are the core of the new generation of cloud-optimized credentials. Some of the different certifications you can earn in the Microsoft Certified Solutions Associate are as follows.

• MCSA: Windows 10: This certification demonstrates you can install, manage, and support Windows 10 desktops and mobile devices at the highest level. 

• MCSA: Windows Server 2016: This certification demonstrates you have the expertise to use the Windows server platform to improve performance and increase IT return on investment. 

• MCSA: Office 365: This certification demonstrates you know how to manage and migrate to cloud-based Office 365. 

Microsoft Certified Solutions Expert

These certifications give IT professionals the skills to design, create, and manage technology solutions using Microsoft products. Some of the certifications you can earn in the Microsoft Certified Solutions Expert include:

• MCSE: Server Infrastructure: This certification shows you have the modern expertise to run a modern data center. 

• MCSE: Private Cloud: This certification shows you can manage cloud computing setups using Microsoft System Center and Windows Server.

• MCSE: Business Intelligence: This certification shows you can design, create and optimize business intelligence solutions. 

Microsoft Solutions Developer

• MCSD: App Builder: The prerequisites for this certification include earning the MCSA certifications in both web applications and universal windows platform. You must also pass one of the following exams:
  1. Exam 70-534: Architecting Microsoft Azure Solutions
  2. Exam 70-355: Universal Windows Platform—App Data, Services and Coding Patterns
  3. Exam 70-532: Developing Microsoft Azure Solutions
  4. Exam 70-487: Developing Microsoft Azure and Web Services
  5. Exam 70-488: Developing Microsoft SharePoint Server 2013 Core Solutions
  6. Exam 70-489: Developing Microsoft SharePoint Server 2013 Advanced Solutions
  7. Exam 70-354: Universal Windows Platform—App Data, Services and Coding Patterns
  8. Exam 70-496: Administering Microsoft Visual Studio Team Foundation Server
  9. Exam 70-497: Software Testing with Visual Studio
  10. Exam 70-498: Delivering Continuous Value with Visual Studio Application Lifestyle Management

Related: 10 Six-Month Certificate Programs That Pay Well

How to get a Microsoft certification

Follow these basic steps to earn a Microsoft certification:

1. Determine the certification you need. There are many certifications available in varying degrees, so you’ll need to determine which one is most beneficial for your career. Consider asking your manager if there’s a specific certification they prefer you obtain. If you’re searching for a job, review job postings to determine which certification most employers seek. 

2. Study or complete training courses. While training is not required, it is a good idea to find a trainer who can help you prepare. If a trainer is not in your budget, you can use an at-home test lab. Practice the labs in the books you have purchased or received from your trainer. You will want to design your own solution to these labs.

3. Take a practice exam. A low score on this practice exam is fine and will motivate you to study. It is normal to score low, especially when the material is new.

4. Renew your certification. Once you earn your certification, you may need to renew it every year. Make sure you know if and when you need to renew your certification so you can continue to list it on your resume.

Related: Guide: How to Choose a Career

Jobs that typically require a Microsoft certification

These jobs either require or prefer those who have earned Microsoft certifications:

• IT specialist
• Technical support specialist
• Software developer
• Web developer
• Software tester
• Software engineer
• System administrator
• Azure cloud architect

Goodbye: MCSE, MCSD, and MCSA Certifications are Retiring

 

In the continuation of the move towards all role-based certifications, Microsoft has announced that they are officially retiring all of the MCSE, MCSD, and MCSA certifications; as well as their associated exams. This means there are a total of 15 certifications, and 42 exams being retired on January 31, 2021. Wow!

Now, we’ve known for awhile now that this would be coming. Back in September 2018, Microsoft first announced the new role-based certification paths with the initial role-based Microsoft Azure certification paths. And, they’ve been slowly adding more role-based paths to the new certification lineup since then. Now that they’ve created role-based certifications for all the most popular certification paths, they are looking to finally retire the old “technology-based” certification paths.

UPDATE: Due to the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic Microsoft has extended the retirement of the MCSA, MCSD, and MCSE certifications to January 31, 2021 instead of the original June 30, 2020 date that was announced.

MCSE, MCSD, and MCSA are being retired January 31, 2021

As Microsoft looks to close one certification chapter, and begin a new, they are going to be retiring the Microsoft Certified Solution Expert (MCSE), Microsoft Certified Solution Developer (MCSD), and Microsoft Certified Solution Associate (MCSA) certifications on January 31, 2021.

Perhaps there’s a song that could be written here…

Here’s a list of the MCSE, MCSD, and MCSA certifications that will be retired:

• MCSA: BI Reporting
• MCSA: Dynamics 365 for Operations
• MCSA: SQL 2016 BI Development
• MCSA: SQL 2016 Database Admin
• MCSA: SQL 2016 Database Dev
• MCSA: SQL Server 2012/2014
• MCSA: Universal Windows Platform
• MCSA: Web Applications
• MCSA: Windows Server 2012
• MCSA: Windows Server 2016
• MCSD: App Builder
• MCSE: Business Applications
• MCSE: Core Infrastructure
• MCSE: Data Management & Analytics
• MCSE: Productivity

If you on your path to earning these certifications, then you have until January 31, 2021 to pass the required exams to earn the certifications. After that date they will no longer be available to be earned. Once retired, these certifications will remain on your official Microsoft certification transcript. In fact, they will remain on your transcript for 2 years from the January 31, 2021 date; after which they will be moved to the “inactive” section of your transcript. With the new role-based exams being active for a period of 2 years once earned, this change makes sense for the MCSE, MCSD, and MCSA certifications to be in line with that two year expiration / renewal cycle.

The MCSE, MCSD, and MCSA certifications will remain on your transcript for 2 years from the January 31, 2021 date; after which they will be moved to the “inactive” section of your transcript

Wait? Does this mean there will no longer be a Windows Server, SQL Server, or C# / .NET developer certifications? Yes, that’s exactly what this certification retirements means. To make this more confusing, Microsoft has stated that you will learn enough Windows Server and SQL Server from the cloud-based certifications offered, and they don’t need to create new role-based certifications for these “on-premises focused” technologies. This is odd angle to all this certification expiration news, and hopefully we’ll hear more information from Microsoft to clarify this soon. However, unless they change their stance and direction, you only have until January 31, 2021 to earn a technology-based certification in Windows Server, SQL Server, and C# / .NET development. Sorry, not sorry, to those who need these certifications for their resumes and to meet employer requirements.

Lots of exams retired too…

With these MCSE, MCSD, and MCSA certifications being retired, the necessary exams needed to earn these certifications will also be retired on January 31, 2021. I know it’s a lot of exams, and you may be worried about your own certification journey, but there are more details for you below.

Here is the list of exams being retired:

• 70-333: Deploying Enterprise Voice with Skype for Business 2015
• 70-334: Core Solutions for Microsoft Skype for Business 2015
• 70-339: Managing Microsoft SharePoint Server 2016
• 70-345: Designing and Deploying Microsoft Exchange Server 2016
• 70-457: Developing Mobile Apps
• 70-410: Installing and Configuring Windows Server 2012
• 70-411: Administering Windows Server 2012
• 70-412: Configuring Advanced Windows Server 2012 Services
• 70-413: Designing and Implementing a Server Infrastructure
• 70-414: Implementing an Advanced Server Infrastructure
• 70-417: Upgrading Your Skills to MCSA Windows Server 2012
• 70-461: Querying Microsoft SQL Server 2012/2014
• 70-462: Administering Microsoft SQL Server 2012/2014 Databases
• 70-463: Implementing a Data Warehouse with Microsoft SQL Server 2012/2014
• 70-464: Developing Microsoft SQL Server 2012/2014 Databases
• 70-465: Designing Database Solutions for Microsoft SQL Server
• 70-466: Implementing Data Models and Reports with Microsoft SQL Server
• 70-467: Designing Business Intelligence Solutions with Microsoft SQL Server
• 70-480: Programming in HTML5 with JavaScript and CSS3
• 70-483: Programming in C#
• 70-486: Developing ASP.NET MVC Web Applications
• 70-487: Developing Microsoft Azure and Web Services
• 70-537: Configuring and Operating a Hybrid Cloud with Microsoft Azure Stack
• 70-705: Designing and Providing Microsoft Licensing Solutions to Large Organizations
• 70-740: Installation, Storage, and Compute with Windows Server 2016
• 70-741: Networking with Windows Server 2016
• 70-742: Identity with Windows Server 2016
• 70-743: Upgrading Your skills to MCSA: Windows Server 2016
• 70-744: Securing Windows Server 2016
• 70-745: Implementing a Software-Defined Datacenter
• 70-761: Querying Data with Transact-SQL
• 70-762: Developing SQL Databases
• 70-764: Administering a SQL Database Infrastructure
• 70-765: Provisioning SQL Databases
• 70-767: Implementing a Data Warehouse using SQL
• 70-768: Developing SQL Data Models
• 70-777: Implementing Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB Solutions
• 70-778: Analyzing and Visualizing Data with Microsoft Power BI
• 70-779: Analyzing and Visualizing Data with Microsoft Excel
• MB2-716: Microsoft Dynamics 365 Customization and Configuration
• MB6-894: Development, Extensions and Deployment for Microsoft Dynamics 365 Finance
• MB6-897: Microsoft Dynamics 365 for Retail
• MB6-898: Microsoft Dynamics 365 Human Resources

If you are currently studying for one of these exams, then you’ll want to take them and earn your desired certification before January 31, 2021. After that date, the exams will be retired and no longer available to sit.

Transitional Paths towards Role-based Microsoft Certifications

There are a lot of certifications being retired, in fact, I believe this is the largest certification and exam retirement Microsoft has ever done in a single cycle. These are big changes, and they have laid out a recommended path for those on the old MCSE and MCSD paths to move towards the new role-based certifications. While there aren’t full equivalents for all the certifications yet, I’m sure Microsoft will be working in the near future (or at least in the next couple years) to fill in blanks as peoples certifications go “inactive” and they are looking to renew again.

Recommended Path to Microsoft Role-based Certification Options – Credit: Microsoft

The current migration path that Microsoft recommends for moving from the MCSE and MCSD certifications to the existing role-based certification paths are as follows:

• MCSE: Core Infrastructure
  • Start with any of these…
    • Azure Administrator Associate
    • Azure Solutions Architect Expert
    • Azure Security Engineer Associate
• MCSE: Productivity
  • Start with any of these…
    • Teams Administrator Associate
    • Messaging Administrator Associate
    • Security Administrator Associate
  • Then take…
    • Enterprise Administrator Expert
• MCSE: Data Management and Analytics
  • Start with any of these…
    • Azure Database Administrator (coming soon)
    • Data Analyst Associate (coming soon)
    • Azure Data Engineer Associate
    • Azure AI Engineer Associate
    • Azure Data Scientist Associate
• MCSD: App Builder
  • Start with…
    • Azure Developer Associate
• MCSE: Business Applications
  • Start with any of these…
    • Dynamics 365 Finance Functional Consultant Associate
    • Dynamics 365 Supply Chain Management, Manufacturing Functional Consultant Associate
    • Dynamics 365 Supply Chain Management Functional Consultant Associate
    • Dynamics 365 Customer Service Functional Consultant Associate
    • Dynamics 365 Field Service Functional Consultant Associate
    • Dynamics 365 Marketing Functional Consultant Associate
    • Dynamics 365 Sales Functional Consultant Associate

I know this list looks to be a bit short in filling the full breadth of what the MCSE, MCSD, and MCSA certifications covered. For example with this change there is no longer a path for someone to get certified with .NET Core / ASP.NET. Keep in mind that Microsoft is continually working on improving the certification paths they offer. So, I would imagine within the next year or so we will likely see more information about new certifications that will be coming to fill in these holes left by retiring the MCSE, MCSD, and MCSA certifications.

Keep in mind that Microsoft is continually working on improving the certification paths they offer. So, I would imagine within the next year or so we will likely see more information about new certifications that will be coming to fill in these holes left by retiring the MCSE, MCSD, and MCSA certifications.

Additionally, for answering your other questions about this change, please refer to the original announcement from Microsoft for more “frequently asked questions”. I’m sure many of you have questions, so hopefully that link helps. If not, maybe we’ll see more information and clarification on these changes in the coming months leading up to January 31, 2021.

Yes, I know it seems Microsoft keeps making changes to their certification programs every couple years. This is true. However, the new role-based direction is one that is better aligned with real world job roles, and are better serving people to help them in their careers. At least that’s my opinion and observation of all the changes towards this role-based set of certification paths. As technology keeps changing, and you need to keep updating your skills to stay relevant in this industry; so do the certifications necessary to test and verify those skills.

Happy studying, and I hope you achieve your certification goals