Congrats to those who passed. I failed- Any tips please?

[babyik]

@ Wreckem. Thanks for taking out the time to respond in detail. I cn see that startin early and investing more hrs is imp. That was of great help.

[vgmalu]

@babyik

Thanks sharky7. So the key point is as many mocks.

I would suggest Konvexity Mocks, they seemed pretty close to the real thing

[babyik]

Thanks to all of you . Celebration time for you all. I am raising a toast for all of you and hope to be on the other side of the table next year. Cheers

[babyik]

@CFAbeatmeup

@babyik

Congrats to all those who have cleared L-3. It would really help us if you could give us some pointers on what do u think were ur strategies that sailed u thru and how many hours do u think is sufficient ? My Band is 4. Thanks in advance.

Please share the tips before you guys vanish away from AF. Ha Ha

At the expense of coming across as a horrible person, may I recommend working on your English comprehension? Not saying you can’t communicate, you’re doing quite well, but CFAI materials and test seem to be written at a high level with a great deal of nuance. That becomes a barrier to those whom English is a second language. Perhaps read directly from the CFAI texts with an eye on nuance. To be fair, the material is dense for me and I basically read 10Ks and 10Qs for a living!

What I did was underline key passages in individual and institutional portfolio management and especially in ethics to ensure I had the important stuff noted before writing my answer, filling in a blank. I think this is an overlooked point that may add some points to your score. Anyhoo, hope it helps!

________________________________

You may like to change the status from CFA Level 3 candidate to Passed CFA Level 3. Cheers

[Hedgee]

Thanks for all the comments here. Helps me as well for 2017. Thanks again buddies. Thanks Babyik for the thread.

[DDub]

I would look into LevelUp Bootcamp (Instructor Marc). The slides/book/classes are set-up perfectly for a pass. I walked out confident and I passed with high marks. Honestly, it’s worth it, all things considered. Cost alone beats spending $120k on an advanced degree, which is another discussion.

[Knock_On_Wood]

I did all the mocks from 2006-2015 which I think helped a lot. Gostudy.io also has a very good guide which really helped for the AM section.

[CFAbeatmeup]

@babyik

@CFAbeatmeup

@babyik

Congrats to all those who have cleared L-3. It would really help us if you could give us some pointers on what do u think were ur strategies that sailed u thru and how many hours do u think is sufficient ? My Band is 4. Thanks in advance.

Please share the tips before you guys vanish away from AF. Ha Ha

At the expense of coming across as a horrible person, may I recommend working on your English comprehension? Not saying you can’t communicate, you’re doing quite well, but CFAI materials and test seem to be written at a high level with a great deal of nuance. That becomes a barrier to those whom English is a second language. Perhaps read directly from the CFAI texts with an eye on nuance. To be fair, the material is dense for me and I basically read 10Ks and 10Qs for a living!

What I did was underline key passages in individual and institutional portfolio management and especially in ethics to ensure I had the important stuff noted before writing my answer, filling in a blank. I think this is an overlooked point that may add some points to your score. Anyhoo, hope it helps!

________________________________

You may like to change the status from CFA Level 3 candidate to Passed CFA Level 3. Cheers

I changed to charterholder. Thanks!

[babyik]

[Cory688]

I focused strictly on AM mocks and prior year exams. Figured afternoon would be a breeze which it was.

[shake656]

1. Focus a lot on doing AM mocks

2. Study before work, I found that when I was studying after work I wasn’t progressing enough

3. This website provides pretty good notes: https://sites.google.com/site/cfalevel3examprep/home

[MrSmart]

Practice.

Do EOC Qs (don’t skip the essay ones), online topic tests, and at least 5 AM past papers.

If you are not scoring in the ~70% range yet, work harder. I was averaging 72% in AM papers, and 67% in TTs. Got ~74% on the real thing.

Also, acronyms and mnemonics were very helpful for me.

http://www.analystforum.com/forums/cfa-forums/cfa-level-iii-forum/91349353

As well as someone’s notes that I cannot be asked to search for right now, I think the guy’s name was Peter. I spent some time on secret sauce during the last 2 weeks refreshing memory every now and then.

And, https://sites.google.com/site/cfalevel3examprep/home

Note that they were only helpful for the parts that I didn’t have enough time to study, or was weak at. Do not use these as your learning resource, rather a handy supplement.

[hashtag]

@igor555

poor Rahul

#LMAO

[jitendra179]

I focused strictly on AM mocks and prior year exams. Focus on CFA Books for EOC, Blue Box. More emphasis on blue box.

Time Allocation-

25 % -Study Chapters ( as you already read in first attempt)

75 % - EOC ( 2 X), Blue Box (2X)- Make notes for tough questions/topics, Past AM question (Segregate topic wise) and see Topic appeared in last 8 years (High chances of topic reappearing if it has not came in last 2/3 years), Practice more for higher weight areas like PM, Derivatives, Fixed Income etc.

Try to Kill PM it has saved me, solve as many type of new questions as possible. So that small tricks can be observed. You can easily get 75-80% in PM in same time allocated for AM, so respect that and try to put extra practice for PM related topics

[thanutj]

If I were have to give you the most important 3 pieces of advice to pass the exam. It would be

• Outstudy. Trust me 300 hours of study is not going to be enough. I believe I spent like 400 hours on level 3. It is the last level and you want to make sure that you put everything on the table in order to pass. Some people say the CFA curriculum is the most reliable source and I tend to agree. But it depends on how each person gets the most out of it also. I personally rely on Schweser and use the curriculum as the second source of reading. Whenever Schweser does not seem to make me fully understand the material, I go back to traditional curriculum. I believe I can do this because I am truly honest with myself whether I do or do not get the concept out of Schweser.

• Stick with the LOS. Make sure you can exactly do what LOS expects you to perform on the exam. For example, When it says ‘Calculate…’, you can calculate what it says. I made the checkmark on each LOS as I go through the reading to make sure that my reading suitswhat CFA expects from you.

• Classic recommendation: Do as many mock exams as possible. Go back to at least 6 years of practice exams. I personally did 6 practice exams (AM+PM) for 2 times. For the essay, keep the answers to the point and concise. Search ‘how to pass CFA level 3’ on youtube. There are a few videos that explain how the graders grade your answers and you will get the idea of how CFA expects you to respond.

Hope it helps and good luck next year.

[babyik]

@shake656

1. Focus a lot on doing AM mocks

2. Study before work, I found that when I was studying after work I wasn’t progressing enough

3. This website provides pretty good notes: https://sites.google.com/site/cfalevel3examprep/home

Thanks abt the new perspective on timing

[babyik]

@Cory688

I focused strictly on AM mocks and prior year exams. Figured afternoon would be a breeze which it was.

Thanks. Even one of my friends who passed suggested spending time on past year mock exams and actual CFA AM exams

[babyik]

@MrSmart

Practice.

Do EOC Qs (don’t skip the essay ones), online topic tests, and at least 5 AM past papers.

If you are not scoring in the ~70% range yet, work harder. I was averaging 72% in AM papers, and 67% in TTs. Got ~74% on the real thing.

Also, acronyms and mnemonics were very helpful for me.

http://www.analystforum.com/forums/cfa-forums/cfa-level-iii-forum/91349353

As well as someone’s notes that I cannot be asked to search for right now, I think the guy’s name was Peter. I spent some time on secret sauce during the last 2 weeks refreshing memory every now and then.

And, https://sites.google.com/site/cfalevel3examprep/home

Note that they were only helpful for the parts that I didn’t have enough time to study, or was weak at. Do not use these as your learning resource, rather a handy supplement.

Thks… the key according to u is EOC + AM [>4]

[babyik]

@thanutj

If I were have to give you the most important 3 pieces of advice to pass the exam. It would be

• Outstudy. Trust me 300 hours of study is not going to be enough. I believe I spent like 400 hours on level 3. It is the last level and you want to make sure that you put everything on the table in order to pass. Some people say the CFA curriculum is the most reliable source and I tend to agree. But it depends on how each person gets the most out of it also. I personally rely on Schweser and use the curriculum as the second source of reading. Whenever Schweser does not seem to make me fully understand the material, I go back to traditional curriculum. I believe I can do this because I am truly honest with myself whether I do or do not get the concept out of Schweser.

• Stick with the LOS. Make sure you can exactly do what LOS expects you to perform on the exam. For example, When it says ‘Calculate…’, you can calculate what it says. I made the checkmark on each LOS as I go through the reading to make sure that my reading suitswhat CFA expects from you.

• Classic recommendation: Do as many mock exams as possible. Go back to at least 6 years of practice exams. I personally did 6 practice exams (AM+PM) for 2 times. For the essay, keep the answers to the point and concise. Search ‘how to pass CFA level 3’ on youtube. There are a few videos that explain how the graders grade your answers and you will get the idea of how CFA expects you to respond.

Hope it helps and good luck next year.

__________

Thanks thanutj. I can see that the commonality in most of the posts is read from original CFA books + past AM and mock questions

[thomasshp]

Last year my first attempt was band 5. Didnt do any serious mock on essay part and unable to finish AM.

This year i also started in around Mar(after working hours daily). Just read through Schweser notes once more and do the exam practices provided. I dont have enough time to spend 3 hrs each for a paper but what I do is to do all MC and Essay Q on same chapter at the same time to consolidate. Just before the exam I just did once real trial.

Like everyone said the more u do AM mock, the more u know how to write only the necessary thing on the paper and save your time. This helps me a better AM score