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On purely maths scale, the difficulty is probably in the 6th/7th grade range. Seriously, I’m not trying to knock the exam in any way shape or form, but you gotta think man, it’s nothing but addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, square roots, and exponent. Absolutely none of that is excusable for getting wrong.
The difficulty comes in the fact of the sheer amount of knowledge you need for the exam and a certain level of reading comprehension. Which, if English is your first language, and you’re a working adult, should come natural to you.
But, I failed band 10 last year, so I’m obviously not qualified to make this claim, as I am measurably too dumb to pass.
@CEO, and in comparison to the sources mentioned above?
Totally agree with the difficulty of the math involved - not terribly complex, but layer in all of the different formulas, terms, descriptions, caveats, rules, etc. and it can be mind-numbingly convoluted. But given your experience, would you say the mock exams / q-banks (CFAI, Schweser, CFAI topic test, etc.) adequately prepare you for the exam? And if you don’t mind sharing, how were you scoring on mocks prior to exam day and how many did you do? One final question, what are you doing this time around that you didn’t do last year? It’s always helpful to hear from people who have been there before, so really appreciate your feedback.
Best of luck!!
THe actual exam is comparatively more straight forward then any mock or CFA mock you do. TOpic tests included.
The writing style is crystal clear and concise. There are rarely distractors/ red herrings / superflous information.
Here is a table, whats the carry trade.
Here is a regression, what is the R^2
Here is two growths. What is the H - Model.
etc etc.
Just keep a cool head on the day and work diligently and quickly. There will be plenty of questions you wont have seen before, just guess and move on. Plenty of low hanging fruit on the exam to pick up. Good luck!
CEO hope the studies went well this year. I remember you from last year. Best of luck on the day and I look forward to seeing your posts on the L3 Forum next season!
I believe the key to this exam is knowing the core material. So many people post questions about obscure lines that are mentioned once in the text yet they dont focus on the core… "Why does the bond put have more upside potential then … "… “How does Multiple R relate to single …”
Of course there will be questions that are mentioned just once in the text, but what are the odds you’ll get those right when you are still uncomfortable with the core material. Know the core material you’ll pass.
aye yi yi… y’all trying to embarrass me? It’s okay, I don’t really care anymore, failing twice was essential to my personal development and growth… By way of background, I passed level 1 when I was 23 delivering sandwiches at a cheese steak restaurant. So, when I became marketable for jobs (obviously operations jobs) the environment was totally foreign to me. I got a girlfriend, money, and was just partying non-stop. Around December my GF got hit by a bus, and was in the hospital constantly. Then when we broke up around april, not having cracked a book I looked like a jackass. I resorted straight to practice questions, but knew what my fate was. I failed 2016 in band 3.
So… 2016 - band 3 - 1 mock exam, rushed reading, barely any understanding of the curriculum. I knew I was going to fail, but decided to take the exam purely for the sake of getting to see it and have the experience - but I still count this experience in aggregate as a bold fail. Not just the exam, but life.
2017 - band 10 - I did 11 mock exams, read FRA/Corp/Ethics from the CFAI curriculum, and all else from the schweser notes. I did not do the EOC questions, Q-bank. I was consistently scoring in the mid 60’s on the schweser mocks. I never scored above 70% on the mocks - I had I think 600’ish flash cards, that I knew pretty darn well… but, 30% of them it was purely just a “memorization” and not an understanding. brought me to another fail…also, I met another god damn girl around april, that I neglected many hours of study time for… and again, history repeated itself when that fizzled out two weeks until the exam, and I looked like even a bigger ‘jackass’. Funniest part is, I actually did BETTER on ethics in 2016. I failed, FRA/Ethics/Portfolio management in 2017. Had I probably done better on maybe 7-9 more questions I would be sitting comfortably pass.
2018 - I’ve now done 12 mocks. Re read the entire curriculum. Took better notes. Made better flashcards. Took time to completely understand the curriculum. completely disregarded women. And I have scored consistently in the high 70’s on the scweser mocks (vol 1 & 2). I scored again in the high 70’s on the IFT mocks. I’ve done every single CFAI online question. I got a 73 on the CFAI mock (haven’t done mock B). I just did the Chalk & Board mock exam and again scored a 78%. I’ve watched every second of the chalk & board videos. I also became engaged in discussion on this forum (which I hope pays off).
could mean nothing though. There’s no guarantee I pass. But comparatively speaking, I’ve never been in such a good position to pass.
That’s your key to passing… Why do you think I post so much?
+1 I think it refreshes my memory
I dont think the exam will be there to trick you, it will be there to test your knowledge of the 10 lovely topics we have been familiar with, and like 125mph has said most importantly the core of each topic , the actual exam should be easier than schweser mocks, official mocks, but that does not mean it will be easy so it is a big pass, what if it is easily testing a part of the curriculum that you have not gone through? or you already forgot? thats why i refrain from dropping topics or readings
But the core of the curriculum is boring… The minutia is where the fun is! ESPECIALLY in derivative/fixed-income.
also, anyone looking for an additional mock exam might check this out.
https://chalkandboard.org/event/level-ii-item-set-workshop/
it’s a full length mock & walkthrough of every question by Nathan Ronen - who is regarded in CFA’land as basically the almighty all knowing power. it’s a steep price, but money is no object right now.
There’s a picture of a female instructor… not sure I wana pay for that!..
lol jk
She’s obviously lecturing on the merits of classical economics???
Super J/K everyone.
You need to stay away from any existing (or potential) GFs till 23rd June that should be your first flash card according to your previous experience lol.
Copied question from quora .com.
Really, really appreciate the color - and seriously good luck this year. Sounds like you’ve done everything you can and your mock scores sound very promising. Hope all of us on here are celebrating in August!
I remember thinking the actual exam was routine compared to the Schweser mocks, official mock, and topic tests. Never attempted the EOC so I can’t comment.
One comment though: Ethics was really hard on exam day, at least for me. I was scoring over 80% on all the mocks but got crushed and finished under 50% on exam day. 
now that’s a real ER analyst right there. Sounds like a response I’d hear on an earnings call
Ha, no intentions of switching to ER - just using some ‘ol fashion business jargon