zestzorb Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > escape-from-alcatraz, from your score matrix it’s > not like you totally crushed the exam so hard that > you could say it’s easy enough that “people with > some intelligence” would pass. > > Personally, I found the exam harder than I > thought, harder than any mocks or practice exams > I’ve taken. you don’t have to ‘crush’ an exam to comment on its difficulty. People are passing scoring <50 in 5 sections so what is the point in getting >70 in all sections? I also sat level 1 last dec so didn’t start until feb. I am not saying the exam is easy by any means but many seem to view the exam as very difficult and also difficult to pass on first attempt. This is what I don’t really agree with.
alcatraz, if you barely pass an exam and then go on to say it was easy, that sounds counterintuitive doesnt it? In fact it is total BS if you ask me. I think this is what zestzorb is implying. I too believe the exam was definitely NOT easy. people who claim the exam was easy clearly suffer from hindsight bias. I do agree with you on the fact that anyone can pass, regardless of IQ ( i base this on the fact that any person who can complete a university degree probably has a sufficient IQ to pass this exam). However i think study strategy is critical. i have seen alot of posters who have logged in close 6 to 700 hours only to fail.
mr_moose Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > alcatraz, if you barely pass an exam and then go > on to say it was easy, that sounds > counterintuitive doesnt it? In fact it is total BS > if you ask me. I think this is what zestzorb is > implying. I too believe the exam was definitely > NOT easy. people who claim the exam was easy > clearly suffer from hindsight bias. > > I do agree with you on the fact that anyone can > pass, regardless of IQ ( i base on the fact that > any person who can complete a university degree > would probablu have sufficient IQ to pass this > exam). However i think study strategy is very > important. i have seen alot of posters who have > logged in 6 to 700 hours only to fail. I did not say it was easy but equally I don’t think it is as difficult as many make out or that there is any specific reason that you could not pass level 2 on the first attempt. The questions are very fair and the mps is not overly high given that you can guess 1 in 3.
i actually found the sample exams on CFAI for L2 harder than the actual exam
escape from alcatraz youre a loser my friend
wake2000 Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > escape from alcatraz youre a loser my friend why?
It’s true, the exam isn’t that hard, although getting a passing score for most people seems to be. I know that statement sounds odd, but anyone who has invested a reasonable amount study time can answer the FCFE question or run through the computations on a binomial interest rate tree. The individual exam questions aren’t THAT difficult. What trips most people up, and this is just my opinion, is that a lot of sorta smart people take shortcuts with their study time, and come out with Band 10 instead of a PASS. Now there are plenty of examples of those who started studying in late January/early February, had FT jobs, and managed to pass. Those are probably the exception. I would submit that unless you were smart enough to figure out Bernie Madoff’s scheme before he was caught, it’s best to start studying at least six months before the exam. Then, if you’re a sorta smart guy like me, you’ll stand a decent chance of passing on the first try.
The difficulty of CFA exams lies in their scope not content. Intelligence plays an inferior role to both memory and the ability to circumvent any traps set around basic concepts that cfai tests. The CFA exams are, by any stretch of the imagination, only generalist in nature and serve the role of a marketing gimmick more faithfully than the desire of candidates to pawn it off as a sign of intelligence.
I’ve already written why I think the L2 exam is harder (http://www.analystforum.com/phorums/read.php?12,1291179) and I would agree that the CFA exams do not require you to be a genius but rather to have a base level of intelligence that is quite high and a recall and tenacity that is rarified now. I have degrees from some of the top universities in the world but I never had to work as diligently as I did with the CFA. In university (even at the Masters level) I found I could get high grades without putting in half the effort required for the CFA. I think I would hire someone with a CFA charter over someone with a uni degree since the CFA shows a chutzpah and dedication that a uni degree doesn’t necessarily (especially w/r/t American universities where grade inflation has rendered GPA’s kind of pointless).* * Before anyone leaps to point out that you cannot earn the charter without a uni degree, yes, I know. It is just a theoretical distinction I am trying to make between the value of the two pieces of paper.