I just completed the two official CFAI mock exams. I scored 64% and 80% respectively. I found them more difficult than the Schweser practice exams.
Anyone else take the CFAI mocks? How did you find them?
I thought there was only one free CFAI mock exam, do you mean you got 64% on the morning session and 80% on afternoon or is there actually 2 full mock exams?
paul, how many schweser practice exams have you tried so far?
@swatty27 - you are right. I did one exam, morning and afternoon.
@cgottuso8190 - I have done almost 6 full Schweser practice exams.
Maybe I was so used to the Schweser exam language and style that I found it difficult to adjust to a different style.
I have decided to spend the next 2 weeks reading through my notes one final time before going back to the practice questions in Schweser Q bank.
@Paul: Have you taken any of the Elan ones? Can you compare those to the CFAI mock and the Schweser tests?
No, I haven’t taken Elan tests. I decided to pick one and stick with it. I score about 80% on the Schweser practice exams.
perhaps you call it a fluke? scoring around 80 on the schweser practice tests is a good spot to be in - have you been taking AM/PM together and timed? also, did you take the CFAI mock timed?
or maybe not a fluke - a 72 across both AM & PM is not too far off…
I agree, overall I am not in a bad place with my preparation. Important now just to see this over the line. These CFAs are a bit of an endurance test!!
Yes, I was timing all exams. However, I haven’t sat 2 exams in one day yet. Could be a fluke, or maybe I just did a bad exam. Tired, after a full day of work. Not ideal conditions.
Have any of you guys done the CFAI mocks? How did you score relative to other practice exams ?
I’ve only done four of the six Schweser practice tests so far but I’ve done them all as full tests (AM then PM), timed, with a very short break in between (approximately 20-30 minutes), all in an effort to build up endurance. I found that at the end of my first practice test I was settling on answers without really thinking them through. In my most recent practice test, I felt little fatigue - a noticeable improvement over my first. My scores have ranged from 72 - 81 on these four tests. I plan to take the CFAI mock this Saturday under similar conditions.
I have also made it sort of a Saturday ritual to wake up early, and take a practice exam either during the same times I’ll be taking the real thing on June 2, or earlier with shorter breaks. This way, come June 2, I’ll expect to wake up and take a 6 hour exam.
I’ll let you know this weekend how I fare on the CFAI mock.
Good idea. You are right. It is important to get trained up on concentrating for 6 hours in 1 day. I will give a go myself. I have been putting it off as it doesn’t sound like much fun!
I’ll be taking the CFAI mock (both parts) tomorrow morning so I’ll comment again when I have my scores. So far my scores on 4 full Schweser exams are in the 67-71 range and you can read more about them in this post: http://www.analystforum.com/forums/cfa-forums/cfa-level-i-forum/91310505
Hopefully I improve on this CFAI mock since it’s got to be the most important one to do well on. I really want to get into the 75% range on these exams so I can feel somewhat comfortable when it comes to taking the real thing.
As planned, I took the CFAI mock today and got a 74.2%. I can’t say I’m disappointed with this result but scoring a little higher would have made me feel better about my preparation so far. I feel that it was more difficult than my four Schweser practice tests. Specifically, while there were more “gimme” questions on the CFAI mock, the questions that were clearly intended to be difficult were significantly harder than those on Schweser and required the synthesis of more information than those from the Schweser tests (especially in the FRA section) I understand I have a month remaining, but I deemed this my acid test and hoped I would clear 70% by a greater margin than I did.
Can I expect the exam to be comparable to this mock?
@Paul: do you agree with this assessment?
@Raleigh: how did you fare today?
I did the CFAI mock today, 80.8% AM section, 85.0% PM section.
The CFAI mock was A LOT harder than the schweser practice exam I did. I scored 85%/85% on schweser’s practice exam I took 9 days ago. I only took one schweser test so far. For the schweser practice exam, I was able to complete each section in 1.5 hours. With the CFAI mock, I used almost the full 3 hours for the tests.
This was definitely an eye opener as to what I can expect on the real exam, I have a lot of weak points I need to touch up on.
double post
@cgottuso - yes, I would agree with your assessment. Some sections I found actually easier than Schweser (Quants and Fixed Income). Others like FRA and Equity were more difficult.
A few people who have already done the CFA have told me that the real exam is easier than Schweser. I can only deduce from this that the real exam is also easier than the CFAI mock.
In a way I think the low score I got in the CFAI mocks will make me study more during the last month. Otherwise, I think there was always the risk of easing of the gas for the final month if you are consistently getting higher scores in the Schweser practice exams.
Well that sounds promising. I have to say, I’m reviewing right now and question #52 in the PM section (FRA, which I agree is harder than in Schweser), is giving me fits. I have a firm grasp on inventory valuation under IFRS/GAAP but I feel that this question is presented in the worst way possible.
#52 for the PM section has the answers switched, there’s an errata page on the website next to the mock exam link that will show you the error.
I forgot to mention that I was surprised at the high number of questions which required the use of a calculator. These tended to take me longer and it took me the full 3 hours to complete the exams as a result.
I fared…alright. After spending yesterday refusing to tally it up I just did and got a 74.2% on the morning section and a 70% on the afternoon section. It’s better than I have been doing on the Schweser mocks, albeit just by a percent or two. I agree with you that there were more gimme questions and also more difficult questions. What was so weird is that I did really poorly on some of the sections that I normally do well on like equity and derivs and I did quite well on FRA which is always my worst section. I did terrible on morning econ which I will have to review in depth. I got EIGHT wrong out of 12.
Anyways, it was reassuring that I’m on the right path and it was a great experience to see what the real thing will be like.
PS, glad you guys mentioned the errata section because I got #52 wrong originally but then was able to reverse it.