Level II is the beast, if you passed that one you will pass Level III eventually if you give it enough time and effort.
Level III is a tough exam with highly qualfied candidates, and there is a thin thin line between pass and fail for many candidates.
If you are Band 7-10, you are so closing to passing you might have failed because you had bad luck with the material being tested (weak areas) or your guessing skills on that particular day might have been bad. Maybe you should have passed on a normal test, or a normal day, and you were just 1 standard deviation away from your standard performance.
It’s my second attempt for Level 3, I passed on my first attempt for the Leve 1 and 2 exams. My conclusion:
If have already read CFA curriculum, the do not read it the second time. For my first attempt, I used CFA cirriculum (completed the material twice), Schweser Qbank, Schweser practice questions and mock exams. I failed.
For my second attempt, I used Schweser Videos, not even notes. I found it useless to read the material one more time. DO NOT READ A LOT! You will jam your brain. There is so much informatino a brain can memorize. Therefore, do not overload it with lots of reading. Instead, use Schweser videos. They clearly explain concepts in a well organized manner. After each reading, I completed the Schweser Qbank. During the last two months, I stopped using Videos and used only the Schweser Practice Exams, CFA mock exams and the CFA practice exam (40$ a piece). I know it sounds a lot, but I spent relatively less time preparing for the Level 3 exam. The videos saved me substantial amount of time.
The Qbank questions and practice exams help you summarize materials. Otherwise you will enter the exam not knowing what the hell you read. Schweser practice exams are well organized and pretty much cover all topics.
Hope you find my advice helpful. Do not let your guards down, I mean it. I thought about giving up last year. Ironically, I started preparing earlier (in November) and like I said, I really didn’t spend a lot of time studying. I just wanted to take my time while studying and enjoy the experience. You will probably have to spend about 1000$ for the Schweser materials, but for me it was worth it. It’s not about money, it is also about time and health that you spend while studying. Good luck! Do not let this result disappoint you!
Thanks! It’s great to hear a lot of people passed on the 2nd attempt.
It sounds like I need to really hit the mocks next time. I did all the EOC questions from Schweser and CFAI ~3 times but only one mock exam. I wasn’t prepared for the essay format and it sunk me. I ended up in band 7.
Last year I failed at band 6, this year at band 9 :(. I had a feeling already sitting at the exam this year that the exam almost deliberately tested my weak areas. There were areas, which I endlessly repeated studying at home only for them not to be present on the exam. Better luck next year, I guess.
Blue boxes are very important, particularly for the AM as flowbe209 pointed out. I did blue boxes and EOC questions MULTIPLE times. For me, this is where I began to feel that I was mastering much of the material. Doing a ton of practice exams helped reinforce my strong areas and just as importantly it highlighted my weak areas.
There’s no 1 right away to attack this for everyone. Everyone is different. But that said, for candidates who have the time to put in the work I think reading through the CFA texts, doing their BBoxes and EOCs and then doing a ton of practice exams is a sure fire way to master this stuff. I felt I did this and walked out of the exam feeeling like I crushed it and today confirmed that.
Passed level I and II in first attempt, and with pretty decent grades too, and was hoping to pass this time as well but didn’t. Very confused and disappointed as I feel I did everything, CFAI material, EOC Qs, blue box Qs, and mocks (in which I did quite well too).
I didn’t seem to do well in am section in particular portfolio. Its one thing to fail having not worked hard, another to have worked hard, felt good about the exam and then get this email. My responses were brief and to the point (from my perspective anyways) so I finished in time and felt good (as opposed to iffy) about it. Basically I must have completely missed the boat on those portfolio essay Qs. So yes, definitely looking for some solid advice here.
Passed 3 for 3 on first attempt, 99% of it thanks to Schweser. Definitely recommend using the QBank, even on Level III. I walked out in the afternoon after about 75 minutes and ended up getting 70%+ on every pm section–for the past two months had a recurring nightmare that there was a whole part of the test booklet that I didn’t see.
For the am section, it’s a bit of a crapshoot, but the only way to do it is to download past am sections – I went through everything from 2008 onwards (they get really irrelevant further back). I would also de-emphasize studying the individual portfolio management. there’s always some detail you miss and ended up paying for it in a lot of wasted time.
Read schweser as many times as you can until May then do as many problems and tests as you can. Aim to get in at least 6 full timed tests. The multiple readings and extensive problem solving are equally important in my view.
Anyone who says you need CFAI is wrong. Anyone who passed the x time on CFAI cannot isolate the CFAI effect from the x-time effect. The incremental return on time of doing CFAI vs schweser, in actual test points, is likely extremely terrible.
The breadth of material necessitates multiple readings. Also, I find reading multiple times, first cursory then more detailed, far more beneficial than one intensive reading with note taking.
However, the depth of material, while not huge, still necessitates enough practice so you can avoid almost all point losses on stupid/formula mistakes and beat the time constraint easily enough so you can double or triple check.
I passed 3/3. For level III an ideal strategy would be
read Schweser first, to understand the topics. CFAI is too fucking wordy for understanding topics.
Then solve Schweser EOC problems. That will make you re-read material that you thought you knew but really don’t.
Then read CFAI material and do blue box and EOC problems. At least for the 2013 exam, Schweser did not cover all the exam material and you needed to read and remember obscure CFAI material to answer the AM Qs.
Next, all the practice exams you can get your hands on.
Lastly, for the last 3 weeks - tailor your study to your style. I did no questions, only read and read. But some people retain better if they keep solving problems. (I know problem solving is supposed to be the better method but for me, a niagara of info by reading and reading works better.)
I really do not understand how collating number of attempts will be of any use. Nonetheless.
I cleared all three levels using Kaplan material (All at one shot each). I have never used CFAI material, none of it. People tell you the need to go through the curriculum million times and to attempt a billion practice exams. The bottomline is - whatever you do, you really need to get under the skin of the subject matter.
I was time stricken for all three levels, possibly under three weeks each (gave level 1 after MBA enrollment, 2 during MBA and 3 at the end). Don’t know how i would have done if i were doing all this during my working days before MBA. My suggestion to you is- you should know the curriculum so well that you can teach a classroom without any hitches. Don’t go after number of hours of this or that.
Went 3/3. Used CFAI, EOC, and CFA Mocks (Schweser mocks for L1 too)
Amount of hours spent on each level:
L1: 153
L2: 284
L3: 243
I attribute my success to taking the mocks very serious. I timed myself in all MC questions, and went through every single question after, regardless of whether I got it wrong or not.
For L3 essay, I timed myself but went question for question. Did 2008 to 2013 essay mocks. Again corrected every question, and took notes of words they used in the answer key.
This is my last post on this website. Good Luck to all who are still writing the exams.
Passed L3 on the first try thanks to Nathan Ronen’s classes and Arif’s videos. Basically 6 weeks before the exam, I was just doing practice and reading plus listening to stuff I was weak in. Arif covered most of the blue boxes, so I was good there. I did some EOC, not the verbose ones.
And finally I gave all the mocks topic wise and did 2 timed mocks from finquiz and schweser scoring around 70%.
This. I don’t think I would have had any chance of passing if I hadn’t done every single mock I could get my hands on and do them seriously. I would attribute 5-10% of my AM mark to just knowing how to answer the questions and what expectations were. That was the difference for me.
Also - don’t write too much. I finished the AM in 2 hours with short answers. If you write too much, you’re bound to write something wrong. Short answers. Make sure you’re answering the question and not rambling. I read/write fast so I have a bit of an edge here, but those that ran out of time were probably overthinking/overwriting it.
Again, mocks help with this. What is the question. Spit out points that directly answer it and not a word more. Done. Move to next.
level 1 - december 2011 - passed with flying colors
level 2 - june 2012 - passed band 11 or 12
level 3 - june 2012 - passed band 11 or 12
Much props and credit to those of you who fail multiple times and stick with the program. I can’t say how hard this thing was and to get through on 1st try, makes me feel a bit lucky.
^good job passme- way to stick it to them proctors for screwing you over. can’t get back the time for this year but at least it’s all over with now.
