there’s definitely an X% of takers (5%-10%) that can probably do it on 70-80 hours very hardcore studying… but no one wants to fail
This is an interesting conversation. I continually hear that engineers prefer level 2 since it’s much more about problem-solving and less about memorization like level 1. I don’t know how much of that is true, but I’d feel much more comfortable if level 2 is one of those “figure it out” tests rather than a “regurgitate trivial information” test.
f2d Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > I majored in comp sci & business. > > Yes, I also spent time doing assignments. > > And yes, I intend to study for the 2 weeks before > the exam. I’ll take a quick look at the material > when I get it. If it looks exceptionally difficult > and has a lot of material I don’t already have an > understanding of, then I might burn all of my > vacation and take the full 3 weeks. > > I don’t think studying earlier then that is very > effective. Anything I read more then a month > before the exam that’s new material probably won’t > stick, and anything that I already know and just > need a review of or that I need to expand my > knowledge on I can do relatively quickly. > > You also don’t need to know 100% of the material. > You need a 70 for a pass. If you know 90% of the > material, you should be fine. gotta admire this man’s thinking
wake2000 Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > f2d Wrote: > -------------------------------------------------- > ----- > > I majored in comp sci & business. > > > > Yes, I also spent time doing assignments. > > > > And yes, I intend to study for the 2 weeks > before > > the exam. I’ll take a quick look at the > material > > when I get it. If it looks exceptionally > difficult > > and has a lot of material I don’t already have > an > > understanding of, then I might burn all of my > > vacation and take the full 3 weeks. > > > > I don’t think studying earlier then that is > very > > effective. Anything I read more then a month > > before the exam that’s new material probably > won’t > > stick, and anything that I already know and > just > > need a review of or that I need to expand my > > knowledge on I can do relatively quickly. > > > > You also don’t need to know 100% of the > material. > > You need a 70 for a pass. If you know 90% of > the > > material, you should be fine. > > > gotta admire this man’s thinking I don’t. BUT, I still wish him the best of luck.
wow interesting…to the point about Level II being harder, I think Level I was VERY easy in terms of problem solving. The hardest part about it was not understading but memorization ton of stuff. I think people who say they will study for 2 weeks and pass with no background are dilusional or very smart and should not wasted time on CFA and go get 800 on GMAT and got get PhD from Ivy. I would like to see a person study for 12 hours straight with no break for 2 weeks straight.
I know people who have studied the CFA in that way… cramming 2 weeks and passing. However, that assumes 2 things: 1- You can take 2 weeks off to only study (no work, family or other commitments) 2- Sure you read everything and have everything fresh in your brain for the exam, but you don’t necesarily master the material, a lot just uses your short term memory which after a few weeks you forget. So, I guess it depends. I do not favor starting way too early either, it becomes very long and painful.
What’s too early? Is December too early?
bleron is that you?
I agree with starting too early, I spent 8 month on Level I, way too much. Should have done more intense 4-5 months. I also overstudied I think.
I have a business background, I took a lot of business classes in college. I also work at a bank. I can take 2 weeks vacation from work, and I’m not married and don’t have kids, so I’m going to shut everything out of my life for those 2 weeks. I also spent roughly 12 hours a day for 7 days for level 1 during my final cram. I could do it for 13 days. I could not get an 800 on the GMAT. First off, I have no intention of getting > 90% right on the CFA. Second, the CFA covers topics that I have the BEST knowledge in. The GMAT Covers a wide range of topics. Third, the CFA had a higher NPV then a PhD from an Ivy League or an MBA when I did my cost/benefit analysis 7 or 8 months ago. The CFA has an economic cost of about 12K / yr for 3 years (That was assuming 325 study hours each exam, so if I can do it in 2 weeks I’m coming in under budget). Assuming an MBA takes 1.5 years to complete, that has an economic cost of around 200K (Loss of salary, benefits, and paying tuition for 1.5 years) and getting a Masters’ and a PhD from a top school would cost you 5 years @ 150K / year (Loss of salary and benefits + tuition, books, etc). As far as the benefits go, a CFA is pretty much equivalent to an MBA in the financial sector, and a PhD isn’t going to be worth the cost.
study for 2 weeks only if you want to re-take the exam the following year LOL
I’m not gonna discount f2d yet…hopefully he’ll be as confident 2 weeks before the exam. I studied 300+ hours on L1 I think…I was just too scared not to. Honest. I’ll be studying a bit more than that for L2 I think. I’m even more scared for L2…it’s probably overkill but this exam is way too important for me not to pass. Cheers, Nash
f2d Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > I have a business background, I took a lot of > business classes in college. I also work at a > bank. > > I can take 2 weeks vacation from work, and I’m not > married and don’t have kids, so I’m going to shut > everything out of my life for those 2 weeks. > > I also spent roughly 12 hours a day for 7 days for > level 1 during my final cram. I could do it for 13 > days. > > I could not get an 800 on the GMAT. First off, I > have no intention of getting > 90% right on the > CFA. Second, the CFA covers topics that I have the > BEST knowledge in. The GMAT Covers a wide range of > topics. Third, the CFA had a higher NPV then a PhD > from an Ivy League or an MBA when I did my > cost/benefit analysis 7 or 8 months ago. The CFA > has an economic cost of about 12K / yr for 3 years > (That was assuming 325 study hours each exam, so > if I can do it in 2 weeks I’m coming in under > budget). Assuming an MBA takes 1.5 years to > complete, that has an economic cost of around 200K > (Loss of salary, benefits, and paying tuition for > 1.5 years) and getting a Masters’ and a PhD from a > top school would cost you 5 years @ 150K / year > (Loss of salary and benefits + tuition, books, > etc). > > As far as the benefits go, a CFA is pretty much > equivalent to an MBA in the financial sector, and > a PhD isn’t going to be worth the cost. You have background meaning you already knew good portion of material. And did you pass Level I? I’m not gonna even get into argument about CFA vs MBA vs PhD, I think the opinion is that top 20 MBA is much better investment than CFA. PhD in finance is not worth the cost??? It’s not, if you are gonna teach. My client, very small American sub of large foreign bank is paying over half a mil in bonus to each their PhDs this year.
I don’t know if I passed Level I yet, I think I did, but we’ll find out in another month and a half or so. I’m sure an MBA or PhD is more valuable then a CFA for some people, but I was only considering my situation when deciding what I wanted to do. Those numbers I’m giving are only for me, and would vary widely depending on each person’s individual situation. Obviously the CFA really only has value in finance, so for anybody not in finance an MBA/PhD is clearly more valuable. And even within finance, it depends on what you want to do. If you want to be a quant, then a PhD has a lot more value then if you wanted to be a trader. Keep in mind another opportunity cost of going to school is you’re not accruing job experience, which also has substantial value. Maybe 2 weeks (or 3 weeks) isn’t enough study time, maybe it is. But I think spending 150 hours or so straight through studying is a lot more valuable then spending say, 300 hours over the course of 4 months. Plus I work better under pressure. If I know that I only have 2 weeks to go through 2000 pages and do practice problems on top of that, it’ll get done. If I know that I have 4 months left, then I’ll procrastinate to the next to last minute
valid points, if that works for you that’s the only thing that counts really I also work better under pressure, but have to make sure I pass. On all of my exams I over studied, I never aimed for 70, so I guess that’s why I think 2-3 weeks is not enough. I also never do all nighters. I spent 8 months on level 1 taking it easy, which was overkill, but I think I got entire Level 1 material down pretty well, so if any of it comes up at level 2 or Level 3, it’ll be a quick breeze through. I guess that’s almost another advantage of taking any of those large/harder exams, you learn how you learn best and what works best for you.
Well, I’m aiming for like ~ 80 so I’m a couple std deviations over the min pass score. But yeah, when you’re aiming for a perfect score, things are a lot harder. For the CFA Exams, I don’t think it’s worth shooting for anything past 80 - 85. Once your at that point, your chance of passing is > 95% (I’m also a very low std deviation test taker… I took the SATs like 3 times and my scores were pretty much exactly the same on all 3 takes – within 10 - 20 points in each of the 2 sections. The last 3 120 question qbank rounds I did for Level I were ALL 87%). I guess if you’re a high std deviation test taker, then more studying has a lot more value. Remember, because the CFA is purely pass/fail, the only thing you should be looking at is the SFRatio, and make a judgment on whether additional study is worth the incremental boost to that ratio. If you’re trying to score a 90 on the exam, chances are you’re just wasting time. I consider the CFA Exams to be an investment just like any other. The investment objective is to earn the charter, not get as high scores as possible on the exams. I put a valuation on the charter (after tax expected cash flows), and a valuation on my time (my current salary net of taxes / # of hours worked per year with certain adjustments). There’s a certain cost for a fail, and there’s a certain cost for reducing the probability of a fail. You should stop studying when the marginal cost exceeds the marginal benefit. I believe the cost/benefit of studying looks something like this: http://i472.photobucket.com/albums/rr86/failtodeliver/CFACostBenefit.jpg At some point there’s a very steep dropoff in the gains you can get from studying. There may be concepts that are hard to grasp, or just silly things you can’t remember. That’s the point where I stop studying. There was maybe 10% of the material in Level I that I didn’t understand at the beginning, and that was the same 10% that I still didn’t understand at the end. It just isn’t worth it to learn it. The other thing is, I can’t learn out of a book. The only reason I can pass these exams is because I’m very familiar with all the material. If you handed me a stack of books on some subject I’m not familiar with and give me 10 years to learn it, I couldn’t do it. How did I learn how derivatives work? I traded equity options, and I learned about how swaps and the like work at my previous job. How did I learn how to understand financial statements? By reading 10-Ks. You get the idea. Note that the reason why marginal cost isn’t linear is because as you study more, it gets harder and harder to find more time, and as such you would value your remaining time more highly.
Half mil Are they hiring phds right now? =NOLIFE Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > f2d Wrote: > -------------------------------------------------- > ----- > > I have a business background, I took a lot of > > business classes in college. I also work at a > > bank. > > > > I can take 2 weeks vacation from work, and I’m > not > > married and don’t have kids, so I’m going to > shut > > everything out of my life for those 2 weeks. > > > > I also spent roughly 12 hours a day for 7 days > for > > level 1 during my final cram. I could do it for > 13 > > days. > > > > I could not get an 800 on the GMAT. First off, > I > > have no intention of getting > 90% right on the > > CFA. Second, the CFA covers topics that I have > the > > BEST knowledge in. The GMAT Covers a wide range > of > > topics. Third, the CFA had a higher NPV then a > PhD > > from an Ivy League or an MBA when I did my > > cost/benefit analysis 7 or 8 months ago. The > CFA > > has an economic cost of about 12K / yr for 3 > years > > (That was assuming 325 study hours each exam, > so > > if I can do it in 2 weeks I’m coming in under > > budget). Assuming an MBA takes 1.5 years to > > complete, that has an economic cost of around > 200K > > (Loss of salary, benefits, and paying tuition > for > > 1.5 years) and getting a Masters’ and a PhD from > a > > top school would cost you 5 years @ 150K / year > > (Loss of salary and benefits + tuition, books, > > etc). > > > > As far as the benefits go, a CFA is pretty much > > equivalent to an MBA in the financial sector, > and > > a PhD isn’t going to be worth the cost. > > You have background meaning you already knew good > portion of material. And did you pass Level I? > > I’m not gonna even get into argument about CFA vs > MBA vs PhD, I think the opinion is that top 20 MBA > is much better investment than CFA. > > PhD in finance is not worth the cost??? It’s not, > if you are gonna teach. My client, very small > American sub of large foreign bank is paying over > half a mil in bonus to each their PhDs this year.
McLeod81 Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > f2d Wrote: > -------------------------------------------------- > ----- > > Level II looks substantially easier then Level > I. > > > > > > > If you’re a finance major and have good > PRACTICAL > > knowledge in these areas, I think you’ll find > II > > easier then I, especially if you suck at > > memorizing pointless things. (like I am) > > > You are absolutely, 100% wrong in your assessment. > > > There is nothing difficult about the level 1 exam, > anyone with 100 hours to spare should be able to > pass. EVERY single aspect of the L2 exam is more > difficult than L1. You won’t understand > difficulty of the L2 exam actually is until you > get 1/2 way through the curriculum and realize how > monumental the amount of info is that you’re > required to master. There is nothing practical > about L2, and and if you want to talk about > trivial questions ask a re-taker about the > Portfolio Management vignette last year. Thanks for the warning McLeod - -
f2d: if you intend to study for 2, or 3 wks max, one has to wonder what the hell are you doing on this forum so early? either bragging about your super skills of passing L2 with 3 wks of study, OR already have started studying so that you may not fail it again. I hope for the better of you, its the latter. Good luck eitherways.
DanLieb Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Half mil > > > Are they hiring phds right now? Not sure, but if you have PhD from top 20, you are always in big demand. On a side note, my prof from school was telling us he was offerent 150k after he did his PhD (not top school) at big 4, with a 5 year partner track. He didn’t take it and went to teach for 40k insdead. And that was about 10+ years ago.