I think the best way to prepare for the am is to talk to thOse who did a good job and find out How they would do it compared to those who didn’t
I would say I did better than average (but I also did worse than average on PM) – still passed so who gaf.
How I Did It: Took all CFAI old AM exams (2007-2014) and TIMED each one the week leading up to the exam as I had already done all the multiple choice from CFAI a couple weeks before and barely reviewed (I think this was my downfall in PM but clearly saved my a$$ in AM).
I also thought I aced the second Institutional question (guess not 
) but the other ones I failed I definitely knew I failed.
Essay
Q# Topic Max Pts <=50% 51%-70% >70% 1 Portfolio Management - Institutional 14 - - * 2 Portfolio Management - Institutional 17 * - - 3 Fixed Income Investments 19 - - * 4 Alternative Investments 20 - - * 5 Portfolio Management - Performance Eval. 15 - * - 6 Portfolio Management - Risk Management 14 - - * 7 Portfolio Management - Individual 18 * - - 8 Portfolio Management - Individual 16 - - * 9 Portfolio Management - Asset Allocation 15 * - - 10 Economics 14 - - * 11 Portfolio Management - Indiv/Behavioral 18 - - *
I got 70+ in all questions in both AM and PM .
My strategy, however, is not for the faint of heart
edit: I used no prep provider, no videos or any 3rd party material. I opened the curriculum, searched for every possible nook and cranny that could be asked in the exam. I listed all of them down in my notebook (needed 2 of them), including every possible formula. I memorized every possible lists, understood every advantage & disadvantage, every factors, every properties, and every procedure (I basically memorized and comprehended every possible testable material for the exam). I practiced every AM exam since 1999 (exluding material out of syllabus) and finished the actual AM exam 2 minutes before it was time. I was lucky enough to get 4 weeks off and truthfully, I might have clocked in over 800 hours of study.
Thankfully, my efforts paid off and I scored 11/11 70+ on the AM and 8/8 70+ on the PM
I got 70+ on 8 out of 11 questions in the AM session (below 50 on the first Individual PM and Asset Allocation; 50-70 in Fixed Income). I am looking forward to seeing the Asset Allocation questions and answers, I thought I had a pretty good grasp on that material.
I did all Blue Box examples in the CFAI text at least once (did 2 or 3 passes on the most important), and did every AM session from 2008-2014. I also did each IPS question from the AM sessions from 2007-2014 at least 2 times (though based on my results, doesn’t appear I had that 100% down). I would say that my prep was 90% AM focused, and I only did a couple of multiple choice mocks. My thinking was that if I could do short answers quickly and efficiently, the PM would be no issue.
Good job guys. I’m interested to see the guideline answers for Q7 and Q9. It looks like 75%+ of people failed Q7.
If possible, when the cfa release some the am questions if the successful test takers would be allowed to show us how they answered them.
You studied too much.
what a weirdo
Different things work for different people. I don’t know if I could do this, but if you really want to internalize the material, I think it’s a good strategy.
I’ve never heard of anyone actually doing this before. This is pretty amazing (if actually true).
pass = ace
simply true… it doesnt matter you aced as long as you get congratulations… whether its 95% or 65%
You are pretty weird yourself to act like this.
“you studied too much”, “you are a weirdo”… haters are so amusing. this forum is chalk full of people writing essay style complaints about just failing this exam, some for the 2nd, 3rd time, some are giving up on the program, and yet this guy decides to go above and beyond to make sure he passes on one try and these are the responses, lmao. kudos to that dude, I am probably going to follow suit and put in 500+ hrs over next 9 months to make sure I don’t have to take this damn test again.
Yes, my preparation was overkill.
I could have studied for 250-300 hours and I might as well have passed with ~5-6 vignettes <50%. However, a couple of silly mistakes during the actual exam with a little bit of bad luck could have landed me another year in this program. The competition in this level is so fierce that individuals spend thousands of additional dollars for classes that last a few days just to get the minutest of advantage for the actual exam. Keeping all this in mind, I decided to take no chances and give it my all to prepare for this exam.
If you think in an objective manner it depends of how much you put a dollar figure on your own time and on the value of having the CFA now vs next year.
If money was the only issue I don’t think I would do any over-studying, but the thing that kept me going is the fact that if I failed I would have forgotten some stuff and then I would have probably to study more overall than if I overstudied a bit.
Since I quite value my time, I did some overstudying to prevent me from wasting time the next year. At the current rates of discounting being near 0, my future value of time is very similar to my current value of time.