CFA Candidate in Signature

I ran across someone putting under their name in e-mails CFA Candidate II. Aside from it being against CFA rules (unless it’s on a resume), don’t people consider it tacky? It’s trying to impress people after passing one exam. Having worked hard for a CFA, I don’t want it cheapened.

One solution. Report him.

I don’t recall it being against policy to put CFA Level II Candidate in an email signature, unless you are doing it and you’re not paid up. If he’s put “CFA Candidate II,” then it goes against the policy of how you refer to yourself, and the guy does a ton of damage to him/herself because most charterholders will immediately spot it and think, “this guy doesn’t know what he’s talking about.”

This could be a violation - listing on a resume is one thing - to let employers know where you are in the process, but an email signature implies a partial designation, which is clearly a no no

I think it’s clear to anyone who has read CFA level 1 ethics that this is a conduct violation. I’m not sure if reporting him would result in anything, but it might be fun to do it anyway just to see if he gets reprimanded… hehehe. Additionally, anyone who has taken the CFA exams is going to think this guy is a tremendous douche after reading his emails, so it seems like he’s just hurting himself anyway.

PtrainerNY Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > I ran across someone putting under their name in > e-mails CFA Candidate II. Aside from it being > against CFA rules (unless it’s on a resume), don’t > people consider it tacky? It’s trying to impress > people after passing one exam. > > Having worked hard for a CFA, I don’t want it > cheapened. Unfortunately the CFA has been cheapened for a while. It would be nice if the CFAI would require at least one or two years of accepted experience before being eligible for Level 1, mandatory company sponsorship, or anything comparable. A structure similar to that of actuaries probably would be nice. The lack of entry controls has damaged the value of the CFA program. Just take a look at our erratic hospital administrator friend, black_ops.

You still need 4 years of acceptable work experience to get the CFA Charter, and this is up from 2 years of acceptable experience just a few years ago. I don’t think that there is any real purpose served by refusing to let people sit for the exams if they haven’t been sponsored by the industry or been a finance undergrad or whatnot. It is in the interest of investment managers to find intelligent, qualified analysts and portfolio managers. People know that these are hard exams. The fact that a lot of people are taking them now does not mean that the people passing them are somehow less intelligent or capable. Remember that in hiring decisions, CFA should be considered in conjunction with other parts of a candidate’s profile, such as where they have worked, whether what they say in an interview sounds coherent and makes any sense, etc.