I really see Indians taking a herd mentality on education. When I got here it was the tale end of the IT engineering bubble here. Now everyone wants to work in finance. Not saying I’d be any good at this system. I’d be screwed as a matter of fact. I think the best thing you can do is something that you are genuinely interested in and not just whatever the cool Indian career at the moment is.
Irrespective of the location, if any adult decides to attain formal education he is following a herd mentality. All who have finished a college degree could not do anything more interesting beacause of lack of courage or in want of a compelling idea. Indians, particularly, are prone to do something which will ensure graceful existence for the rest of the life rather than to pursue which has uncertain outcomes. Reasons are 1)lack of social security 2)Little accumulated wealth
^^Kinda agree, but getting an education is kinda like getting insurance, so you have something to fall back on if your ‘great’ idea doesnt work out
There are 548 charter holders in India compared to 49,000 in in the US. Hardly a bubble.
When I started the program, in December 2008 (Jesus seems like a long time ago), if you wanted to get the Charter you had to fly to another country to take the test. I took the test in singapore that year and literally half the convention center was Indian. I believe you have been able to take the test in India since 2009 which means this would be the first year that Indians would have been able to complete the program locally. Just watch the number fly through the roof now that you can take the exam locally.
When I started the program, in December 2008 (Jesus seems like a long time ago), if you wanted to get the Charter you had to fly to another country to take the test. I took the test in singapore that year and literally half the convention center was Indian. I believe you have been able to take the test in India since 2009 which means this would be the first year that Indians would have been able to complete the program locally. Just watch the number fly through the roof now that you can take the exam locally.
ChickenTikka Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > When I started the program, in December 2008 > (Jesus seems like a long time ago), if you wanted > to get the Charter you had to fly to another > country to take the test. I took the test in > singapore that year and literally half the > convention center was Indian. > > I believe you have been able to take the test in > India since 2009 which means this would be the > first year that Indians would have been able to > complete the program locally. Just watch the > number fly through the roof now that you can take > the exam locally. It’s not going to happen. Roughly 0.016% of the US population has a charter and 0.000047% of the Indian population has a charter so about 184,000 Indians would have to pass all three exams and meet the work experience requirement in order to match the US. That would be tripling the number of CFAs in the world. Further, you would need a dramatic increase in candidates to reach that level considering only 7,700 Indians wrote in June 2009 and 9,900 wrote in June 2010. Compare that with the almost 30,000 that wrote in the US in June 2010.
Let me disclose that I make a living hyping the India story, so my bias is pretty clearbut: I consider that pretty impressive growth for a program that has really only just started to flex its global presence in the past few years and wasn’t even really a possibility before 2009. That India would have nearly 1/3 as many candidates as the US in only its third year in India is pretty amazing. The Indian GDP isn’t 1/3 the United States. I bet the finance sector isn’t 1/3 the size either. When you consider that size of the investment, from an Indian salary standpoint, that is even more important. The other reason I think there will be massive growth in Indian CFA candidates and charterholders is that the CFA program is much better tuned to the competitive education environment that Indians are accustomed to. Only 1-5 people who start the program finish it. I bet in India this will not be the case. Furthemore, that newsweek article mentioned growth of candidates in the “Asia Pacific” region. While I can imagine that a lot of people are taking it all over Asia, I bet India will be the new CFA Bubble.