To cut to the chase, for Level I I was super confident, I had above 80% correct answers with Kaplan, official topic question and sample exams on the CFA website. When I took the Level I exam in June 2018 for the first time, it went super well, and after a couple of months I got the official confirmation - top 10% result, above 70% score on all topics except Portfolio Management (which is quite strange, as I had 98% correct answers during preparation but w.e.).
Now, for Level II the situation is somewhat different. I’ve already gone through all the books, Kaplan Q bank and Practice questions of CFA. I have 75% correct answers on Kaplan with 73% on average for other candidates (so I’m better than average and you expect Kaplan candidates to be better than your average CFA Level II candidate), but on the CFA website I have 67% correct answers and I’m at the 63% quartile of all results. Now, I’m of course a smart guy so I’m about to begin my serious preparation and that’s the part I’m good at, so I’m not worried…but I have a question.
June Level II exam 45% of all people passed, which means that if other candidates and me are to take the exam right now, only 37% people would have a better score than mine, hence with the 45% pass rate, I should still pass (assuming that the pass rate does not change).
Does this mean that the Level II MPS is much smaller than the one for Level I, or simply Level II candidates will dramatically improve their scores before June and I should aim for above 70% again? I’ve seen that people on forums estimate the MPS for Level II to be in the 63-68% category? If there is an unfortunate soul who did not pass Level II in June 2018, can you please share how your scored in the different subjects approximately (e.g., 65% ethics, 75% quant, etc.). I’m fully aware that CFA does not give out individual scores, but you can still get a good indication.
You have to take your percentile (by the way, the word you were looking for there was not quartile) with a grain of salt, as the system isn’t robust against folks retaking the online topic tests and increasing their scores.
If you got 67% on the CFA online questions on a first pass through that’s pretty solid I think. As you point out, it’s still early (on all 3 levels I usually started my studying around this time, so I wouldn’t even be looking at topic tests for at least another month) so plenty of time to polish things off.
To the question you asked, it seems to be the low to mid 60s that’s the passing score, but of course that’s just an estimate.
There are still more than 3 months left for the exam and you already covered all the books, CFAI QBank and Kaplan QBank.
If you are a smart guy, I recommend you to don’t overthink about the MPS as of February 22nd. Relax, review the topics you think you have a low score, and you will pass comfortably.
Given the slightly altered format of the new exam (i.e., more vignettes, fewer Qs per vignette), I think average historical MPS is no longer an unbiased estimate of expected 2019 L2 MPS. (Assuming that the percentage of candidates that pass does not change wildly from past years.)
I also approximated lot of candidates approximate scores based on their exam scores. It’s not difficult to approximate it when you can see few candidates whose score was around 79 and they passed, at the same time there were some candidates whose approximate score was around 78 and they failed marginally. So the approximate MPS was around 79 out of 120.
i dont think many candidates have completed the practice and mock sections…so with more candidate participation (and scoring more than you) your percentile may go down slightly…
Yes and no. Even if CFAI never admits it, I am fully confident there is a strong correlation between MPS and % of people passing (e.g, CFAI aims to let roughly 42-46% of candidates pass) and adjusts the MPS as such.
Based on my current results, assuming average score doesn’t significantly go up, even if I stop preparing right now, I should still pass the exam (this is a purely theoretical setting of course which assumes I keep the same % of correct answers, etc.).
Well last year they changed the scoring report so it’s pretty easy to estimate your score.
I failed last year and I got roughly 63-65% (don’t remember exactly), with my score line marginally below the MPS line. That’s with a 67% in Ethics so no Ethics up/downgrade I assume.
Based of that, I assume the MPS is between 65%-67%, so not as low as some think.