^ apart of one mock, I was scoring 80+ in all AM and PM. The feared 2012 AM was ok to me. I just flunked 2011 PM Mock that I’ve got 60+ in.
On the exam, what made me lose my confidence is:
AM, I finished 10 min early, I skimmed through some of the questions and answers. I found a note below one question that i missed and made a huge difference. It rendered my previous answer invalid. so I changed the answer. I wonder how many of such things I’ve missed.
PM. I calculated some answers, was confident. My answer was among the choices (of course). After the second round, I realized that there was a small twist. I recalculated. I wonder how many of such things I’ve missed.
This is beside the expected normal silly mistakes.
On praying, my God is not different than Thomas Jefferson’s.
Passed level 2 with <50% on ethics along with <50% on 3 others. Luck favored me that year, probably got just one or two points above band 10, Here’s my score matrix-
Last year: took it on 2 hours sleep, band 10. Thought I got killed in the am session and I did fine, throught I did well in the PM session and had too many brain farts and failed pm which cost me overall. Also did lousy in ethics which I was upset at, you have to nail ethics.
This year: took it on 7 hours eleep, yeah for sleep!! makes a ton of difference. AM was very out of the box and hard, not sure I passed it. PM session I know I did very well including ethics. hoping for the best.
This is so true. I was #3 last year. I’m not saying it’s impossible to slay the AM, but if you think you crushed it 9 times out of 10 you got crushed. Feeling #1 this time through.
Not trying to exploit or showcase your results here Traveller but this seems really good for a Band 10 considering only 7/19 sections >70%.
In fact I’ve seen a lot of results from 2011-2014 where there were in total around 6-8 sections >70% that either got Band 10 or just passed (Ethics adjustment?).
Is this common? Because this gives me an eerily false sense of confidence that I really do not want to cling on to until August…
[Btw I’m a first-timer on L3 and I agree with the majority of sentiment discussed across AF today.]
I was sitting in front of the bathroom and thought that once the exam began, nobody will go to the bathroom. I was wrong, there were someone going there every 2-3 minutes (no kidding).
I was hearing the hand dryers all of the AM exam. Its really bothered me and I lost my attention.
I’m really mad they did not oblige the candidates to use paper instead of hand dryer.
I ended up asking for a new seat for the aftenoon as I did’nt want losing time doing it during the AM session.
So far, it’s not fair because depending where you are sitting you have some advantages or disadvantages.
I paid the same cost than everyone and should have an equivalent seat i.e. NOT IN THE BATHROOM
It was my second attempt this year after a band 7 last year. I felt AM was tougher than 2014 and PM was trickier too. I fell for traps on the PM last year and lost valuable points including some crucial points on Ethics.i felt i did well on the AM last year only to be disappointed when the results came out. I think you need to discount atleast 5-8% from the score you expect for AM…overall 2014 vs 2015 i did marginally better or the same in AM and much better in PM. I think crushing PM (including Ethics) is the key to pass this beast no matter how well you think you did in the AM…
If I’m your boss and I read this, I’d move your office next to the printing room. It would be mean, but so funny. I hate and oppose such mean acts, but this one is very tempting. Admit it, you yourself would laugh from inside. Sometimes irony is funny.
In other posts you mentioned you’re facing some difficulties in English as it’s your second language. Beside your current job, I would assign you the Editor in Chief of the internal company blog.
Though this is not my intention, but these actions of mine would make you stronger. I, as your boss, am accepting your sincere gratitude. You are most welcome
On a side note: I hope you’ve done well despite the circumstances
I pulled an all-nighter, not by choice, both on last years and this years. My experience last year was the exact as yours. I was almost falling asleep towards the end of the PM lol. I actually did pretty decent though all things considered and how many questions I left for the AM (band 10). This year I, for some reason, functioned fine despite sleep deprivation. I thought this exam was really straight forward as far as the material goes. I am a little shocked at how many people are saying how brutal it was. I think the format is what through so many people for a loop. I actually agree with you on ethics. There actually weren’t a lot of tricks if you knew where to look. I can think of one question specifically where you could see how someone would cross out what actually was the correct answer, because it seemed so randomly off, and try to narrow it down the remaining two choices that were entirely subjective. The trick was that whereas with most past exams you can answer such questions by merely reading one paragraph for one question at a time, this one required you to read on into the next paragraph. Also, the AM was in a totally different format than anything I’ve seen in the past. I think someone on here saying it seems like CFAI has traded off depth for breadth and I would agree. The exam was not so challenging as far as the material this year, it was all about the format I think.
agree with you on Ethics - it is the most straight forward of all the sections imo, just read the CFAI text and there you have it.
The AM session material was not that hard, but they totally changed things up this year so it screwed up a lot of people including me. This is why L3 is very hard to study for especially the morning, its the most unpredictable of all 3 levels. You can study for 300 hrs or 700 hrs but at the end of the day its not about how much you know, its about executing on exam day and that is very hard sometimes for the AM portion of L3.
Last year I died in the PM due to lack of sleep. I did pass L2 on 2 hours sleep, but exan day is such a brutally long day that sleeping like a normal human being certainly helps. Hope you passed, good luck.
you’re crazy if you think ethics was “straight forward” this yr. i read through ethics the last 2 days to try to figure out a few answers and still couldnt do it. you could have written the Ethics material yourself and still had to guess on at least 5 questions
there are always 1 or 2 questions in Ethics that are odd, but that is expected. I actually have more trouble interpreting what they are looking for in some of the IPS questions that Ethics. Let’s hope for the best and pray for no more studying ever.
This is my second attempt. Last year i got 6. I feel i did better in AM section this sttinings comparing to last year AM section as I did not have good preparation last year although I left out at least 20 points this year as i just could not figure it out how to solve those. Not 100% confident the rest i answered as I am worried there is some tricks which I may not be able to pick up.
PM section this year is really very very good except the ethics section. So I am not getting any benifit PM section at all as almost everbody can score over 75% So i am in the same line with others.
Im also a retaker though my last L3 exam dated back in 2011 (Band 10) after that i left the CFA saga to focus on my VC-seed investment career. 4 years fast forward, I decided to finish the beast and enrolled in March. I must say Im MUCH less prepared than my 2011’s cfa. I think i spent less than 80 hr. this time (compared to 300 hr. as legitimately prescribed by the CFA world) However, let me compare how i felt this time - my AM went much more smoothly this year , i felt a bit lucky too as what they asked is what i was reviewing the last week ( i just got a new job so no way i could dedicated myself during the day / night digesting all the formulas). I practiced AM for 2009/2010/2012/2013 .All these were done with CFAI book opening ALL the time( I spent 1 day for each am exam , feeling crappy as i forgot the formula, but the concept came back pretty easily for me) I felt that trhese practices helped me write better than in 2011 ( im not a native speaker ).If i have to guess , i figure that 65% should be what i reached this time in the AM . - my PM went worst than 2011’s as the lack of formulas kinda set me back .However, Im pretty sure i can get 65% min. ( I practice PM exam for 2 years without any formula knowledge , just go with the concept and scored around62%). All in , I will be reluctant to say that I will pass but dont think im gonna get worse than band 9 ( i was expecting a lot worse like band 6 ). I think what really helped me are the following - Career /personal exposure to main subjects : I have 4 years of proprietary trading experience so it helped a lot with equity valuation , economics, derivatives ( futures only ). Then i switched my career to seed investment for another 4 years which means venture capital where i was exposed to fund raising , marketing prospectus which helped me see clearly on the issues of alternative investment and GIPS/ethics related. Also , during these VC years I also invested my personal wealth in the equity market so I have experienced all the bias the behavioral finance listed . - Think positive and Stop thinking about how horrendous it will be to go into the test without doing CFAI EOC /without practicing the whole list of formulas : After I practiced 4 AM exams, I decided that I am going to memorize only 10 formulas that I have the highest chance to succeed for follow on conceptual questions ( such as no. of futures contracts , relative valuation , using swap to change duration , active returns measurement, sharpe, treynor information ratios etc. ). At this stage, i had to be realistic with my brain capacity .L3 is more of a concept test so it s useless if i can memorize the formula ( which can only give me a score of 4 minutes question worth) but fail to answer on other important concept questions. - Intentionally left 2014 exam untouched : what are the chance that they are going to ask the same things 2 years in a row? i better rev up my weapon from old exams ( By the way did I mention that I use CFAI 2011 books ? as i still have notes all over the pages. ) Lunch Break : I utilized it on reading one chapter of the CFAI book and bingo ! i manage to nail 3 qs from it (3/60=5%, I cann’t tell you how i felt when i saw it and it also helped boosted up my confidence to deal with ethics /GIPS ) This is, by no means , not the way to prepare CFA l3 but sometimes life is unpredictable and plans can be ruined so i hope at least my “survival” strategy may be of use for someone out there . I may fail this time but i really feel great of not giving it up just because of little time of preparation. Good luck every one !
You may try Yoga ( especially breathing exercises ), if you have sleep deprivation on exam nights. 45 minutes morning exercise will keep you awake and fresh throughout the day. I had sleep problems during my school and college exam days, but I didn’t know about Yoga then. This year I used short sudarshan kriya ( breathing exercise) for my two exams including CFA l3. I felt quite refreshed during the entire exam period.
Agreed. I laugh to myself whenever someone thinks that they crushed Level III. I passed Levels I & II on the first try and retook level 3 this yr (band 9 last yr). Thought I passed last year and was devastated to get my first fail during this process. This year, I amped up my studying and felt WAY more prepared. Result? Still freakin’ hard but think that I have a good shot at passing. No guarantees, of course.
I thought the AM was definitely harder than last year but doable. I finished all of the questions (not that they’re all right) with a little time to spare. PM was probably just about as hard as last yr. Overall, I did MY best which was hopefully good enough…
