Ok two concerns here. Given the new topics this year: taxes in PM and PE boost in Alt. Investments. What areas do you see as most likely to be tested. FSA & Equity I figure we need to know it all. Other topic Due to the 3 questions, pass rates are predicted to be higher. But, does this mean the passing score now will be at 70% or north, etc…??? I know there is no definitive answer here, but I’d like to read your input. Thanks.
Ethics. You can’t leave anything in L2 as margin of error is very less because of 120 questions instead of 240 questions in L1. You don’t want to be in band 10 just because of only 2-3 incorrect answers. (There is only a matter of 2-3 questions to diffrentiate between Band 10 and PASS)
Isn’t it that the consensus is the MPS is determined as 70% of the top 1% score. So if the new question format (3 answer options instead of 4) is going to raise the scores across the board, I think we can assume the MPS will go up as well. However, I doubt it would go up that much. But in the end non of us really know.
is there a point to this meaningless speculation? topics - we have agreed anything’s testable. so high probability – what can you say? MPS, scoring rate, score - all that we’ll know towards end of August. This is the first year. Previous years you had a precedent - hover around previous year score, this year nothing can be said. now only point we all agree upon is the “difficulty” of the test - so we move on.
^ voice of reason
cpk123 Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > is there a point to this meaningless speculation? > > > topics - we have agreed anything’s testable. so > high probability – what can you say? > > MPS, scoring rate, score - all that we’ll know > towards end of August. This is the first year. > Previous years you had a precedent - hover around > previous year score, this year nothing can be > said. > > now only point we all agree upon is the > “difficulty” of the test - so we move on. CP your posts are always great. I disagree with you though that this is pointless speculation. There are subtopics that can be assumed to be tested with greater probability than others. I’m simply asking this question because time is short now and I want to focus these sections. FSA, Equity, & Ethics are a given, know it. Should we know everything else? Yes. Do we have to know it perfectly? No. So IMO, there are some things in Corp. finance for example that you should know how to do better than others. That is the point to my original question. I do see your side with pointless speculation, but that is not what I am trying to do here. I am choosing my battles.
What is the point of this speculation ? 1. We are going to be spending time writing about what each of us thinks is important, instead of spending time reviewing. 2. Increasing our stress levels because A said something, B said something else. So rather than do that, agree that only so much can be done, and leave it to each individual. Each one of us is going to come up with a topic where each one of us feels inadequate. Not necessary that CFAI thinks like each individual amongst us. Probability is just that - pure unadulterated speculation.
the show NY Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > ^ > voice of reason +1, im still not touching Treynor Black.
here’s the problem. take corp fi. maybe these are the big 4 areas: 1. capital budgeting- i would bet strongly you’ll see the initial outlay, op cash flows, etc stuff, maybe you get a q or 2 on budgeting or real options to round that bad boy out or some EAA or whatever those replacement decision things are called. pretty much all of reading 28 smooshed together 2. capital structure, MM, operating/financial/business etc risks, etc. 3. mergers/acquisitions 4. corp governance (more likely i’d think you’ll get maybe 2 corp gov q’s stuck in a mergers or whatever item set vs 6 q’s just on corp gov, but it’ll be there. but the problem is- there’s going to be either 1 or 2 items sets on corp fi. so let’s say there are 2. then do you roll the dice on knowing only 2 of these 4 really well? you can’t. you have to know something about each. now, within the capital structure stuff, maybe you don’t remember how to calculate DOL or DTL… so maybe you boot that 1 question out of the 6. if you hit most of the MM propositions and what leverage does to a company, you might be ok. but then they could get random one on let’s say international differences in leverage and you’ll rack your brain saying crap- if a country has a strong legal system, is the use of total debt higher or lower and is the maturity longer or shorter? AHHHHHHHHHHH you’ll go on test date and hopefully you’ll pull it out of your &ss remember back to some qbank quiz you did 4 months ago. honestly, you can’t game this thing. CPK has it right- you literally have to put yourself in as good a position possible to know enough about almost everything so that nothing is coming out of left field. because a few of the q’s are going to be pretty random, but the big stuff will be there too. it’s as much defense as it is offense. sure, i’d love to be awesome at everything but it’s not possible. do i think on most sets i could go 3/6 at worst? i think so. assuming i’m good at something out there, maybe this puts me in a position to do ok. there’s some luck to it, but i think it’s more about those extra hours spent by the folks that really have studied to know enough stuff to make this massive amount of information come together on test day. and corp fi is a small topic. try doing that above for equity. your 4 sets or so could be on about 15 bigger topics I’m sure. you can’t game this thing.
I went through Treynor Black this weekend. Pretty much spent my entire saterday on it. Not that I really understood too much of it and that time would of probably been better spent on reviewing other stuff. Anyways What do you think is the average score of the top 1%? 115/120?
I think it’s cpk - 120/120 - 100%
we are talking about top 1%…I think should be between 110-115.
I remember the dude from Stella said neverbody ever got 100% before but i’m sure people have gotten close so 118-119 for a few people every year. But 1% of 10,000 people is a larger variance so i’m thinking average of 115 so 80 questions right is min to pass, so we can get 40 questions wrong?
I agree with everything banni and cpk on this one, having been through all of this once already. You just have to know everything because you never know what will show up. That said, my advice is that if you really have to budget time and you’re at the point where you don’t have any choice, go for knowing certain topics REALLY well and then the rest well enough to at least pick off the easier questions. I.E. forget trying to cherry pick certain LOS’s from each section (for instance, FX in econ and Treynor in PM) as the randomness of the exam will make it highly likely that the ones you pick never even get tested. If you take Schweser’s online course, I think Andy Holmes said it pretty well when he said that you need to have 4 or 5 really strong areas and then know at least enough to get the easy points for the rest. His point being that it doesn’t take a ton of study time to get the easier questions on every topic, but it will take a LOT of studying to get the harder questions in each topic. You should be ready to KILL FSA and equity since those are the big dogs of the test, plus have at least three other areas that you’re strong in. For me, I think those will be corp finance, ethics, and econ (plus maybe alt inv, we’ll see how that goes this week). I’m relatively certain I will tank derivatives but even there I want to make sure I know enough not to go worse than 3/6. For the rest, I will know at the very least something about every LOS but will allocate my study time accordingly. Hope this helps at least some. P.S. Whether or not a topic is new doesn’t seem to have much bearing on whether it shows up or not, so I really wouldn’t use that as a gauge for what will or won’t show up.
4/6 on every vignette and you will come out of the exam hall with a hand-stand.
I believe CFAI subscribes to this philosophy that everything is relative. So, if they have set the target pass rate to be 40%, you need to beat 6 out of 10 people on the exam in order to pass. What this means is, all these speculation on what would likely be on the exam and how much I need to get on QBank + mock exams are pretty pointless. The deciding factor is really in how you perform relative to the other people on D-Day. Even CFAI won’t know how people will perform until they look at the test papers. If you want to know what topics people in general feel are difficult, that’s not unreasonable to ask. (But trust me though, you probably end up getting a lot of different answers due to diversity in people’s background. e.g. I have a math degree so naturally Quant is my strength; people who have CA would probably find FSA easier than me.) You know, excessive speculating could cause anxiety and would cause you to lose focus. How about just pull things together, focus, work hard for the next 30 days or so. Walk into the exam on D-Day, with the prior knowledge that no one has ever gotten perfect (and acknowledge that you are of no exception), give it your best shot, walk out and enjoy the sun until August?
As in…4/6 =good?
Yeps. Say Top 1% score is 115/120 70% is MPS of Top 1% 0.70*115 = 80.5 = ~80 80/20 = 4 correct in each vignette.
Make it EVEN simpler: get two right, get one wrong; get two right, get one wrong, repeat that 40 time and you’ll pass! swaptiongamma Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Yeps. > > Say Top 1% score is 115/120 > 70% is MPS of Top 1% > 0.70*115 = 80.5 = ~80 > 80/20 = 4 correct in each vignette.