I think AM was quite lengthy. I left one sub question on which I had no clue. I managed to write on rest of the questions. There was couple of areas on which I wasn’t comfortable that was tested. So, I am sure I did not do pretty well there. PM was a breeze. Overall, expecting ~65% in AM and ~75% in PM. As h21 said, for me as well, if I don’t pass, won’t be giving it again as I could not put in more efforts than I did this time.
PM was definitely harder than expected, and some left side questions which were not well covered in mocks/ EOCs/ test topics
Hi, nice to see you again.
AM was difficult as expected and after initial shock I had started solving as a machine and succeed to finish with 15 minute to spare which I used to revise and make supplement note to 2 subquestions. I did not leave any part blank but I was guessing on 4-5 subquestions and not sure in some of my other responses.
PM was not easy but I was easy going until the last part when I had a blackout and forgot some formulas. Although, I was guessing on 3-4 multiple choice questions and not sure in additional 6-7, I think I was able to solve PM between 70-80 %.
I feel quite less optimistic than I was feeeling after L1 and L2 but still think I have chances to pass.
I spent about 650 hours to preparation, started in August last year but with 2 months break during last fall, thus like I had exactly started
about mid October. I had done exactly 37 AM paper test by stopwatch turned on including 10 of those in full Mocks with multiple choice Mock as PM part. I went 3-4 times through TT and 3-4 times through official EOCs. If I failed, the only thing I screwed is I haven’t used CFAI Curriculum readings so much then relied mostly on Schweser.
Best of luck to all!
650 hours and 37 AM papers… if you don’t pass then who should
Yep. I invested much more in L3 than in L2 and irony I was 90 % confident after L2 and now only 55%. We’ll see.
I’m in the boat of both were difficult…maybe I’m having a Recallability trap here but I felt a lot of them were things I hadn’t seen (or recalled) from the books. A lot of knowledge extensions combined with very intricate details. Praise be though for Hashtag or whoever suggested not going in order. If I started with the start…I would have lost my mind.
50 more hours in 3 then 2. Finished 3 with a whole month of revisions. 72% and 80% on mocks with time to spare. AM scored relatively well on the 10 I ran. Topic test averaged a 73%. Going into 3 I felt prepared, very prepared. Only thought a couple could Q’s knock me of my game, hit my weakspots HARD the last week.
Felt steamrolled by about 10/60 questions in the afternoon. Felt 12 or so were very very very tough to differentiate (To the point where I’m not sure if I was bleeding in required/recons or stuff like that). In the AM felt 2-3 were bananas to do. A couple felt really easy…to the point of “It’s a trap”. I truly believe that 2017 will be one where candidates in the subsequent years will go “WTF was that”.
I seriously think (and hope) you will definitely pass. You have put tremendous amount of effort. How much score approximately are you expecting in AM section?
I think the am difficulty was as expected , i did relatively well on it , wasn’t sure about 2-3 answers, answered all questions, finished in around 2 hours and 20 mins. But i found the PM much more difficult than expected, i was 50-50 in 4-5 questions and didn’t know some,hopefully pass ,definitely not that sure as in level 2.
I was flying through PM (+20 minutes) and then BOOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMMMM
About 60 % till max of 65%. I cannot judge how graders will treat some of my answers. I did not use bullets. I used short sentences (2-3) with key words highlighted and circled solutions at calculations questions. I put formulas in calculation responses as well.
I am on the same boat as far as AM section is concerned. For PM, I am expecting above 70 in at least 6-7 topic areas and 50-70 in the rest. Hope it will counterbalance the AM part.
zero sleep night before exam.
survived on AM : left 15-20% questions on blank, but quite sure for the questions i filled.
PM was easy for me (rating difficulty only 6/10), only 1 calculation i cannot get on derivatives.
Topic Tests : 8/10
Mock Item Set: 9/10 --> i only got 50%AM /55% PM
EOC : 7/10
i did EOC 1 week before exam until the game day.
i even still practicing doing implementation shortfall calc 2 days case on the morning before the exam (6 AM).
60% AM + 70% PM = 65% overall
Could be a pass if MPS is 65%.
I was killing mocks, but I don’t think it means anything. I won’t be surprised if my AM score will be better than PM, because I hated every minute of the latter and did stupid mistakes I shouldn’t have done.
I just hope it will be over.
I am little disappointed, not because of the difficulty of exams but because of my poor performance and time management. I really do not know how anybody could finish the AM in less than 2h (I left 1 entire question/ set and made few stupid mistakes). Beside the fact that I spent more time and effort than in L2, my chances to pass L3 are really small.
My estimation is AM – 55 -57% and PM – 67-68% = Total 61.5% +/-1%.
Am section: Finished the am section with 10 seconds left and a paper cut. Thought the focus was on some really obscure areas and the timing was pretty insane in terms of reading through the facts. There was deffinatly some tricks thrown in that made you stop and think a bit which isn’t a Luxery you have on the am section. I bombed the first section but picked up points in the later sections for sure. Thoughts on am 60-70%.
PM section: thought this was much easier. Finished in an hour and 30 minutes. Went back and reviewed some of the more tricky vintages. Thoughts on pm 75+
Hoping for a pass but that first am section might have thrown me off my game so we shall see. Defiantly some weird focuses on this exam compared to others.
I thought both the sessions were fair game. Average difficulty. However I’m starting to believe the MPS might be 65%. 
Haven;t heard many people failing to complete AM this time compared to previous years.
65% is overly conservative. Last 10 year average pass rate was 51%, which in my mind roughly translates to 49% MPS.
Even if that estimate is too naive so far polls have been diverse I don’t see why this year was easier. On contrary I think it was tougher than some other years hence pass mark could be lower.
Let’s hope MPS won’t be over 60% this year. I don’t think I would score higher than that.
AM - flunked one whole question for sure and about 4 subsections I was fairly weak on 2 left blank basically. Finished with seconds.
PM - Was a lot harder than last year. If i divide the test into quarters for me it went like this… Q1: fair questions, Q2: nuanced some wtf questions Q3: ‘hmmm hope im not falling to traps here but getting answers’ Q4: straight forward. my calculations were working out but you never know if there is something you have overlooked.
Overall - worried about the AM slightly more than the PM and hoping other people had similar issues.
To make everybody feel better as I was walking out one guy said ‘I left the last 3 blank in the AM’ so there we go…