Work hard on L1, and pass. Put in the same effort for L2 and prepare to get your a** handed to you.
Pass Level I first! Then worry about making time for Level II
I’ll be sure to add my $0.02 if the news is good next week. But yeah Level II is supposed to be an entirely different beast.
Bump. Hoping to hear plenty more opinions…
Will come back later and share.
- I probably only put in ~125 hours. I stopped counting after I finished “reading” the curriculum. I only counted about 100 hrs spent on the curriculum. The rest was spent doing EOC questions, Schweser practice exams, the CFAI mock, and my own personal flashcards and notes. Keep in mind that I had learned most of the material in school, which explains why I was able to spend so little time dedicated to CFA. 2) I used the curriculum exclusively. You don’t need to use 3rd party providers. 3) Didn’t purchase Elan, qbank, Schweser, etc. I don’t think you need them if you have a good basis in the material (I took it during school). I was given the Schweser practice exams by a friend who used them in 2009. When I do level 2, the only think I will purchase will be the practice exams Unless you have a memory like a computer, you will always run across questions that you don’t know. There is too much material for them to draw from. Some things that I did that others may or may not agree with: -Skipped a lot of the quant section because I hate statistics and didn’t feel like trying to learn it, so I guessed a lot on the test. One person commented on here that I’d learn my lesson when the results came out. I got 70+ on quant. -Didn’t do the EOC questions as I went through. I came back after I was done the reading and did them before the practice exams A warning though… don’t necessairly follow my advice if you haven’t recently studied this stuff. I have my undergrad degree in accounting and finance and I have a masters in finance, so I eat/sleep/breath this stuff in school. Final results: I passed with 70+ in every section except alternatives and derivatives (got 51-70 in those sections).
I read Schweser notes and CFAI text for ethics and weak areas. I did all EOC 2 times(first,after finishing reading and second, during revision period) Also, several mock exams( schweser, elan, BSSA). Practise question till last day. I think that was my key to pass the exam. Schweser Qbank is OK for begining but dont spend much time on it. It is way easier than actual exam. Happy reading to L1 taker.
-Schweser notes only, except Ethics -Did lots of questions through mock exams, Qbank, and read Quicksheet alot -Found exam easier than mocks, more parallel to Qbank question (Esp. format wise)
- I used Schweser exclusively and passed with >70% in almost all areas. I found Schweser to be a lot more concise than CFAI curriculum. 2)Take a mock exam a few weeks before the real thing, it really helps get used to the pacing of the test and it will highlight weak areas to work on. 3)The best advice I can give is to do tons of practice questions, but don’t try to memorize answers that you got wrong, there is almost a zero chance of that question being on the real exam. Just go back and read that topic.
Now that we all have our exam results back I feel I can offer some solid advice to future LVL 1’ers. To OP’s questions: 1. That’s about right. May vary depending on how much you know and how intensive each single hour of study is for you. 2. The End of Chapter Questions alone make it worth it. You are forced to buy the books anyways when you register IIRC. 3. I used Elan for the readings – their materials hit just about all the good stuff you need to know in clearer language than some of the other providers that I’ve sampled. You should check the erratum though because this past semester they made some pretty significant errors in the original printing of the text. 4. (1) Use flashcards to memorize factual sorts of things, (2) do a lot of mock exams that both the CFAI provide and from 3rd party providers; do all the end of chapter questions from the CFA curriculum several times, (3) make sure you bring something that’ll help you fall asleep the night before because I wasn’t able to get any sleep that night on account of anxiety, (4) bring some caffeine pills (nodoze perhaps) to the exam (this only works well if you don’t have caffeine often). The CFA website has several hints and suggestions for preparing and taking the exam and I thought those were helpful. You should look at those.
If you don’t have a background, CFA books are the best, in my opinion. I went through almost every page (did only-theoretical chapters e.g. Corporate Governance from Elan) and then revised, did practice questions and mocks from Elan. I felt that without going through the CFA books first, Elan notes wouldn’t have been very helpful. I did make flashcards because people raved about them but didn’t take much benefit out of them. Went through all of them a couple of times, 3 at most. I had made my own notes of Quant, Econ and FRA which came in very handy during revision because those chapters are huge and cumbersome… I found FRA quite tough initially… At the end of it all, I was over prepared for the test. Walked out feeling that I would faint if I found out that I had flunked. There were a total of about 8-10 questions that I wasn’t sure of (many of them in Ethics though the section turned out to be easier than anticipated)… CFA books have everything you need to know and in a language which is fun and easy to understand… they give you complete background of everything you need to know for the exam… try to stick to the flow (book 1, book 2 etc). Of course, as I said in the beginning, my opinion is for people who have zero finance background. Things will be much different for others.
I have zero finance background. And worked on level 1 for less than 4 months. I think those who have the time crunch, can opt for Schweser (apart from Ethics , ofcourse). I believe that i had been a little lucky, passed even though i was miserably bad in accounting.(apart from derivatives and accounting got 70%+ in all sections) No offence to Anish,but I found CFA books extremely tough, verbose and needless to say, boring. And i didn’t understand most of the things and i wasted about one full week on accounting without understanding any concept. Schweser is handy and quite to the point, i should say. Q-Bank also helped and yeah, their mocks are good. My take on it: It helped to google stuff which i didn’t understand. And prayers help apart from working hard.
I’ve been browsing on this website for some time and for me with a finance background nothing could beat the stuff from Schweser. Funny thing is, I know a lot of stuff however, you need to get the core down packed and Schweser did it for me. The thing that brought everything together was the Secret Sauce and Qbank, without those two I probably would have scored another top 10! As per what other people have written, the books are good but again your learning of the core will become distorted as you focus on crappy test cases and other rubbish. The exam is easy, remembering everything is the hardest part to it!
- I studied just under 100 hours; it wasn’t enough. I felt unprepared and was convinced I had failed. I got 70%+ on 7 sections and 50-70 on the other 3. I wouldn’t recommend it though - 250 hours is about right. I had a strong undergrad (Phil&Econ) so I guess that helped. 2. Only used Elan guides. 3. I can’t tell you which one was best, as I only used Elan. But Elan covered the material for L1 nicely, the practice questions were good and I felt the mocks were representative. 4. Question practice
I did a degree and a postgrad diploma in finance, work for an investment fund as an entry level investment officer (been here 8 months straight from uni) and my University is a partner with the CFA institute. I didnt even open my cfa books and got 70+ on every section. I studied purely from the schweser study books and pounded through the Qbank for about 250-300 hrs all up, also got a week off work before the exam which was absolutely key and i strongly suggest a good week where all you have to think about is cfa! Level 1 in my opinion was a walk in the park but i hear horrible things about lv2 so I dont think my next set of cfa books will sit collecting dust!
I’ve no idea how many hours I’ve clocked in for this paper but I really did put in alot of effort into it. I worked for an IB in Malaysia and that doesn’t give me a lot of time to study after work. But I was disciplined enough to allocate about 2-3 hours every few days to study and was intensified in the last 2 months (1 week study break, etc). In all honesty, L1 isn’t that hard but one has to be well prepared for it. The volume is massive though not that difficult. And especially if you’re working, that’ll be an added challenge to study after working hours and weekends 
I came from an engineering background and have only worked for less than a year. The LOS were pretty challenging but as long as you put in effort and your heart to it, not a problem I only used Schweser for my revision, never attended any classes, did lots and lots of of QBank, did all the Schweser mocks and the CFAI mock. Although I feel Schweser’s style of questions are quite different from the real mccoy, it does give one a wholesome understanding of the syllabus and it should suffice.
I just used only Elan’s Ultimate Pack. Here’s what I did for anyone who is interested: Step 1: Watch the lecture for a reading. Took notes on slides while watching) Step 2: Read the study guide for that chapter. Too notes in Eleventh Hour Guide while reading. Step 3: Do Elan’s practice questions and CFA EOC questions Step 4: Read CFA EOC summaries to make sure I had everything covered. I was done with steps 1 through 4 by mid-April. Then I primarily relied on my own notes and mock exams and the Eleventh Hour to review. Elan was excellent. Much cheaper than the others and I can confidently say that their study guides are better than Schweser. I had purchased a used copy of schweser notes 2010 and i feel that elan definitely gives more complete coverage and makes the curriculum more easy to understand. Good luck to all the future CFA Level I Candidates.
Sell-side and buy-side experience, top school undergrad degree in economics, age 35, married, two young kids, working 50 hours per week. I started studying late February using only Schweser Notes, Schweser Practice Exams, and the CFAI Mock. Scored between 70% and 86% on 120 question practice tests, and between 72% and 76% on 240 question tests. Passed with 50-70% in PM and 71%+ in everything else. Things I would do differently if I had to do it again: Use CFAI books for ethics and leave yourself more than a couple weeks to do just practice exams.
I think it would have helped had all of you also included your backgrounds. Nevertheless, your thoughts are much appreciated. Best of luck for level2.
My comments. I took 2.5months, but note that I came from an actuarial science background, having passed a few of the SOA preliminary exams. Turns out, it helped a lot, though I am currently working. CFAI wasn’t easy, due to the breath of the material. My advise, revise, revise, revise, till it sticks to ur mind. Painful? Yea, but u have to.