I intend to follow the same strategy that I used for L1 and L2 i.e. using Kaplan books and IFT videos and study on my own. Is it doable? I know it’s silly to ask but I am worried about the AM section and I know people pass through self study but I … I am just really nervous. Is taking classes a better idea? I really want to be done with it next year.
Oh also thoughts on Kaplan and IFT for L3??
Another thing, I only use the official curriculum for EOCs and Blue Boxes, will that suffice for L3??
This question is probably better to ask after August 28, given that the current crop of Level 3 candidates still haven’t gotten their results.
That said, I’ll go ahead and answer your question. I did basically the same study program that I did for level 2: Kaplan Schweser for the course material, CFA topic tests once I finished a section of material, and then lots of mock exams after I finished the course material.
That said, there are three things to note. 1) As you mentioned, the essays are the new challenge for Level 3. Think of them as a hidden LOS, because part of the challenge of Level 3 is learning how to do an essay portion of the exam (the MC portion of Level 3 is widely considered to be easy). Practice a lot of them, under timed settings. 2) The Kaplan Schweser essay mocks are garbage. I tolerated them as part of the mock exam process, but supplement those efforts with actual historical AM sections from CFAI, because those are frankly better written (and are written by the folks who will write your exam!). 3) While I used Kaplan, there are a LOT of candidates who feel that for Level 3 it’s best to use the CFA’s material for studying instead of 3rd party material. I didn’t, I only read through some pieces of it after the fact and the presentation seemed pretty cool but I don’t know anything about it’s overall quality.
Hope this helps. And hopefully I’m not still here in 2 weeks thinking about next year’s exam…
Shamelessly going to use this thread to ask similar.
I completed CFA II using the Fitch online portal, Scweser books and the CFA official online question bank.
CFA III is essay based however and I wonder how you can ever self mark your answers based off essays?!
Also this is my first ever post. Wahay!
Good luck with your results!!!
For Level 2 I used Mark Meldrum’s videos and Wiley’s books. For Level 3 I am going with Mark Meldrum’s full subscription (Highly recommend) + CFAI books and maybe Levelup bootcamp(higly recommended by a lot of people).
Same questions here
It depends on how you learn best, but self study is certainly doable. EOCs and Blue Boxes for practice is fine, but you’ll also want to practice all the CFAI provided portal topic tests as well. More importantly, you’ll need to practice on the actual past year’s AM exams. CFAI provides the past 3 years, and older ones are out there with a bit of digging. Do as many of them as you can under timed conditions, going back maybe 5 or 6 years (for relevancy). An instructor or class can give you tips and strategies on how to tackle the AM paper, but that information is available all over these forums and elsewhere.
IFT dedicates a good amount of time demonstrating how to answer questions on the AM paper in his crash course and AM exam review videos, so that will probably be good enough.
I passed in 2017 and here was how I did it:
Read entire curriculum - EOC and BBs twice - Topic Tests twice - IFT Crash Course for short recap videos, audio to pound GIPS into my head, and his AM exam solving videos - GoStudy notes for condensed notes and tips on where to focus attention - wrote my own flash cards and reviewed them regularly - Did 8 past year’s CFA AM exam papers (did a 2nd review pass on the previous 3 years) - CFA provided online mock - 3 Schweser Volume 1 PM mocks (don’t waste your time on their AM mocks).
Some people swear by Mark Meldrum and/or Marc LeFebvre’s Level Up Bootcamps. I didn’t need it, but I’m sure they’re great.
The bottom line is self study is just fine if you’re disciplined, work hard and stay on schedule. If you’re still nervous, spend the extra money on classes and/or an online video course to ease your fears. Good luck!
Use levelup for CFA L3. Marc is really good in teaching different topics and how one links with the other one. Plus his slide deck is amazing. Very detailed plus refer to buzz words as well from the cfa course material.
Use levelup for CFA L3. Marc is really good in teaching different topics and how one links with the other one. Plus his slide deck is amazing. Very detailed plus refer to buzz words as well from the cfa course material. His videos explains every topic in detail and also goes through blue boxes which are essential in L3
^^ Thank you guys !!!
A lot of people think what provider to choose and whom to choose in addition what videos to watch and what question bank to use. Does it come to your mind that maybe it is beеter to just concentrate on the free CFAI curriculum?
No because video lectures do help you understand and as far as the official curriculum goes, if I can understand a concept from reading 3 short pages, why would i waste my time reading 10 pages ??? It’s just way too long and boring. I might read it for L3 but didn’t read a single thing for L1 and L2.