Let's discuss mocks vs actual?

Lets talk about how we felt on the real thing vs the the mocks I assume we all took.

Little background on me: finance background from top 10 undergrad b school, grad 2012. Failed June 2013 on band 9.

I took a total of 4 mocks. When I say “mock” I am referring to a 120 question truncated mock not a full thing. Anyway, I took 4 of them, two schweser and the two CFAI mocks available at the website. My scores were as follows:

1 schweser 1–> 93/120 good for 78

2 schweser 2–> 90/120 good for 75

3 CFAI morning–> 85/120 good for 70

4 CFAI afternoon–> 90/120 good for 75

now with thise those scores you would think I would be confident. I am not. Every single mock (even the 78) after I wrote the exam I was convinced I got a failing score (in 60s) yet every since time I passed the mock. And I felt the real thing was slightly harder than schweser but easier than the CFAI mock. In between. You guys agree? I would like to hear an honest opinion from a charter holder on what my chances of passing are. Do not be afraid to hurt my feelings

Bros, lets share our experiences with each other on this thread. Post your mock scores and how you felt about the real thing. Hopefully we can help talk each other out of suicide?

Let’s not and say we did.

LOL

I would rate the actual a little easier than the CFAI mock, and the Schweser mocks around the same level.

Well in terms of difficulty

CFAIMock vs Actual

1)Ethics ? ? (you cannot be really sure about ethics)

2)Quant A bit easier Little tricky

3)FRA Similar Similar (both were similar in terms of difficulty)

4)Economics Similar Similar

5)CF Easy Little lengthy

6)Portfolio Relatively easy few questions were tricky

7)Alt Easy PM session had few trciky monsters!!!

8)Fixedincome Similar Similar

9)Derivative Similar Similar

10)Equity Difficult Comparatively easy

Note:These are my personal opinion.

There’s only one way to find out!

That’s the real charm of CFA exams, you can never be too confident and you never quite understand why you pass or why you fail or why you get band 9 from your score distribution…

I hear ya, Tommyjohn. I took a total of 6 120-question mocks with varying degrees of success but at no point did I feel confident about any of them. I feel the same way about the actual exam, but at least it’s over for now. Granted, I only studied for about 4 months part time and probably need a few more months of study, especially on FRA, but now I can only wait and see.

I think I’ll need a good amount of luck to pass the exam but I feel like it won’t take a huge amount of effort to pass in June. Overall, I thought the mocks from Schweser and CFAI were about as hard as the exam. It’s the sheer volume of material that hurts my little brain when I try to cram it all in at once. A quick word on my background, I’m an economist with a masters degree in economics.

I can’t remember off the top of my head the exact scores, but here’s roughly how I did on the mocks:

Schweser - 1: 64%; 2: 55%; 3: 67%; 4: 52%; 5: 66%

CFAI - 1: 67%

As you can see, my scores were all just short of passing with a few on the margins. So I’m assuming I’ll have to take it again this summer but at least I’m in the ball park. It’s a difference of about 10 more correct questions in each session, so that’s not too much to ask for.

The way I see it, even if I have to take a few of these exams twice, the return on investment in the CFA is way higher than a second graduate degree, so that’s been helping me sleep at night.

Good luck to all of you - I really hope you get some good news in a few weeks. And make sure you enjoy the time off!

-john

@John…I wish u the same…You have decent chance of passing…Don’t think negative…May all of us present here come out with flying colors on the result day…:slight_smile:

Thanks a bunch and right back at ya, @nishcool. I’ve got a good shot at passing so I’m definitely in a positive frame of mind but what’s that saying, hope for the best but prepare for the worst? lol

In any case, I like the positive thinking so I hope everyone can relax and enjoy the next few weeks, then get some good news at the end of January. I turn 35 around then so I’m hoping for a good birthday present from CFAI. :slight_smile:

You are very old @johnny… Just kidding :0

I tried BPP mock, CFAI Mocks thats it.

the scores were around 54% to 57% in all (I did not count the ones where I had guessed. with guessing, I scored about 60-62%)

Haha, true statement. But if you’re only as old as you feel, I’m about 97. :wink:

I took 3 Schweser Mocks and the CFAI mock. I thought CFAI mock was harder than actual which was harder than Schweser.

Schweser 1 - 74%; 2 - 76%; 3 - 79% (these were the full 240 questions)

CFAI Mock - 70%

After each mock I felt pretty unsure of how I did, similar to now, so I’m hopeing the results are similar.

I felt the morning actual exam was easier than the CFAI mock but I felt the afternoon actual was more difficult than the CFAI mock. I took 2 full mock exams CFAI and the Schweser Online mock scoring 74% on them both.

I also took the 60 question CFAI practices and got 75% and 80% on those.

Like others, I didn’t feel confident after taking any of my mocks and don’t feel completely confident about the actual either. I’ve never gotten below a 70 on any mocks and I’m just hoping the actual exam isn’t my first.

I think it’s tough to feel completely confident after an exam like the CFA unless you really nailed it and got like a 90% on it. We’re all trained in school that anything below an A is sh***y so that’s how our minds work.

It’s hard to differentiate in you head whether you got more than 70% right or not. In your mind, you just know you missed a lot of questions, didn’t get a 90% and therefore feel bad about your performance.

That’s also true, because over 70% can be 71 or 100, so you never really know how good you did.

Although if you do over 70 in every section it probably means you did well, but that still doesn’t mean you get over 90%.

I COMPLETELY agree with this statement, its one of the more accurate CFA things i have heard said on this site.

I think that unless you aced it, or bombed it, you will feel unsure about your performance. Like right now, I am tabulating in my head things i thought i got right or wrong, and it is a fruitmess and exausting mental exercise.

Last june as i said I got band 9…when i left the exam room in june, i thought i had BOMBED it…i felt i guessed on half the questions. when i found out that i was on band 9 i was actually very pleased with how it went, and i hope that i am underestimating myself on this exam just like last one. I didnt get below a 70 on any of the 4 practice exams i took, so i hope that the real thing falls in line with my performance.

Guessed half the questions and still got Band 9? You had to know some stuff to score that high. You probably passed this time…

Just think how hard the CFA would be if the questions had 5 answer options each instead of 3. Wow.

I think it was very similar to the 2013 Mock, but with much better wording