- How many of you are reading the Standards of Practice Handbook? 2)Is this really helpful? 3) If so, what edition are you using? 4) Also, how many days would you spend studying Ethics?
- a good majority of those on AF 2) Yes, it has some additional details. It’s a quick read, can be done days before the exam. 3) The newest addition is avaliable on Amazon for order or CFAI for free. Both are the 9th edition. 4) It depends on how strong you are in that area. Ethics is very important on this exam and could make or break a pass/fail if it comes down to it. I think I spent about a week, and of course more on review as time goes on. Spend as much time as you need to get a strong grasp of the material.
Thank you cfacowtown!
The CPH is included in the first edition of the CFA texts. I’m reading them at least twice more, and even Schweser strongly recommends reading the texts for this.
sbmarti2, I bought a hard copy SPH for this test and the CAIA. The SPH has some additional examples and information in it then the CFAI text. Check the website.
do you feel schweser material is sufficient prep for ethics? or should SPH from website also be read? thanks, John
Schweser is a good start, but I highly recommended giving a skim through SPH now and a couple days before the exam. It’s not a hard read, it can be whipped off in 30 - 45 mins. They say ethics is the make or break in some exams, so I wouldn’t take the chance in not reading it.
the 9th edition is dated 2005. Does it mean no changes since then?
That is correct.
So, just to be clear – the Standards of Practice Handbook is included in the CFAI Ethics material. So, as long as you do the CFAI material, you should be fine, correct? Also, in the CFAI material GIPS section, there is a lot of optional reading segments. Can we skip this or is there a probability that we will be tested on this material? Thanks in advance!
no optional segments are included in the exam itself, but they can give you a better understanding of the entire ethics. the Standards Of Practice handbook is an easy read so and since Ethics is such a major part of the exam, it will definitely not hurt to read it.
I’m a L2 candidate and can’t stress enough…do the free ethics test… http://www.cfainstitute.org/centre/codes/ethics/self_exam.html
I didn’t even know about that test guilleku1, thanks a lot. That is an excellent resource.
Guilleku1, thanks for the heads up with the ethics exam. As for the GIPS’s optional section, I plan on reading it and it should help I think. From what it looks like, we’re responsible for studying the summary, and then the optional section is more detailed. Therefore, I would guess it would give you better comprehension, and from what I’ve heard, don’t underestimate GIPS.
sbmarti2 If your taking the more detailed road I would pull up the full copy of GIPS off CFAI: http://www.gipsstandards.org/ I actually downloaded the full copy and its a pretty decent read. The required CFA material gives you the 10,000 feet view while the entire GIPS handbook really drills down. It’s not that long of a read, maybe 5 - 6 hours solid. As you and many others have said, don’t underestimate GIPS.
Hi cfacowtown, I read many of your posts and I was wondering about the timing you said reading the SPH would take…are you talking about the same book of more than one hundred pages…? I just want to certify myself that I have the book you recommend…but if it is the same I think the timing for me is far too stretch. I appreciate your help please. many thanks
Tigas Yes, the SPH book is more than one hundred pages. It took me approximately 4 hours to read it the second time through, and I can’t recall how many times the first. I really think its important to read the SPH for a strong grasp on ethics, however, your scores on a sample or mock exam will indicate what degree of importance this is to your overall plan. To test this, load up your qbank, select only ethics questions and make sure they are on hard only. Aim for high 70’s low 80’s. If you can get this, I would leave the SPH till a later date. If your not scoring high on ethics, consider this mandatory. The timing to complete the read-through will vary from person to person, but its importance will not.
Many thanks indeed cfacowtown , i’ve just done my first “test” and things are pretty bad…as I suspected…it was the one with sample questions from cfai…I think i will go for q-bank now… not very in the mood after this first impact… tomorrow will be better. thks again.
FOcus on Ethics the week before. You need it to be fresh. The reality is that no matter how well you prep for it, since it’s such a grey area to begin with, it’s tough to ace that section on exam day.
guilleku1 Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > I’m a L2 candidate and can’t stress enough…do > the free ethics test… > > http://www.cfainstitute.org/centre/codes/ethics/se > lf_exam.html THANKS guilleku: did the test and got 82%…yeah, the Qs were a bit tricky…I had to read each Q 2 or 3 times…anybody else done it? I had 9 incorrect answers but it didnt give me the right answers once I completed the test???