Hi, I started studying in July for Dec Level 1. I am done with Ethics, Economics, Almost all of Quant and now Im on FSA. Im studying from the CFA book and towards the end of the Quant section it got real tough(topics on Common Probability Distributions). I just wanted to know from anyone who took the exam how can you solve some of these quant questions in 1 1/2 mins. thx gayatri
not all questions are designed to be solved in 90sec. some of the ‘low hanging fruit’ questions will be 5,10,30 second questions, leaving some other questions like calculating diluted EPS with WASO to be 2-3min questions. The quant questions can be pretty quick if you just practice and know the 68%, 90%, 95% distributions on the top of your head and how to setup the z-scores, etc. quickly.
i dont think so they expect so to do entire one page calculations
thx for that…but what Im finding hard is all those formulas in the probability concepts section on Total Probability Rule, Bayes Formula and the others. Whats the best way to know which is applicable where since now that I am doing FSA I have kind of forgotten a few of them. What do you suggest ? Do I go back and do it all once I finish the portion or go back to them right now and be thorough with them? thx gayatri
gayatri, best way is to do q bank and that is how you know which one to apply under given circumstances, for example if the question says given then it is conditional or if there is a word “or” in question then they are talking about addition law. “and” kewword is multiplication law. for bayes p(b/a)=p(a/b)*p(b)/p(a) and p(a)= p(a/b)*p(b) + p(a/b^)*p(b^)----- this is total problaity http://ocw.mit.edu/NR/rdonlyres/Electrical-Engineering-and-Computer-Science/6-042JSpring-2005/AD2E811D-B3D9-4600-AE94-60E78470873E/0/rec18.pdf p(b/a)= b will happen if a happens, example: bmw sales up by 20% as cost of steel declined from 18% to 10% a quarter
for conditional probability w/ bayes the best way to quickly get the correct answer 100% of the time is to draw a probability tree
thx guys