aahhhh, garp…got it…i sat for level one of a similar exam…it may have even been garp…gave me a great leg up when i decided to do CFA exam instead-- if you are through level II you will cruise the first level exams on FRM i would imagine…honestly, i didn’t even know the difference between FV and PV…had no idea how to do it if you can imagine…and i passed. just remembered…it was PRMIA, professional risk managers something something.
Took L1 in Dec’07 and found the freshness helped (and the 8 week break was adequate to forget the misery of it all). The thing that got me was that, though I was pretty sure I passed L1, I didn’t want to order L2 books, Schweser materials, etc… until results were official so right off the bat you’re basically cutting yourself down to 4 months to pack in the 300hrs or whatever you’re planning on. That means averaging like 15 hrs a week which is a bit rough. Will definitely affect your family life (older folk) or social life (younger peeps). Just the same, I’m glad I did it the way I did. Ask me again in 10 weeks.
I took and passed it in December. I started studying for L2 in early Febrauary, my wife and I had our first child in mid-april so I took a couple weeks off then, and didn’t finish the material until 2 weeks from the exam. I took the week before the exam off to study. While I feel that I probably passed, because of the late starts and all of the interuptions throughout I wouldn’t be shocked if I flunked it. The afternoon ethics killed me, because I didn’t review the research objectivity standards before hand, I didn’t feel good about PM, and I missed both BOP Econ questions. There were a few more gray areas, but all in all I felt okay about things. Like most people, if the exam ended at lunch I’d be feeling great.
I did Level I in Dec. I think it’s easier to take level I and level II back to back because material is still fresh.
did level 1 in december, and i’m feeling the non-stop studying effects now…
I took level I in december and level II in june. the truth is, is really hard to study that bunch of concepts in 3 months. I made this twice and I don’t know if I will pass level II. If you have dicipline and is determined to leave your personal life for a while you can do it. Now I can tell that is a really hard time!
I waffled for a few weeks after the results came out, before signing up for L2.
if there is L3 in Dec. 2008 I would f**king write it. I have been burning for 1 year now…I don’t mind burning for another 5 or 6 months because my opportunity cost for CFA is negtive.
I took the Level 1 exam in December '07, got my results at 8:00 am on Jan. 23rd, by 8:10 I was signed up and ready to go for Level 2. The two months between taking L1 and jumping into L2 was more than enough… The 4 months that I had to prepare for L2 was plenty, could have done it in three. That said, you have to be serious about this if you want to succeed. I studied from 9pm to 12pm every weekday and was able to get by with 5 hours of sleep per night. I was really tired by the time I hit the home stretch, but who gives a sh!t, it doesn’t matter. Burnout is ALL mental. It can be ignored if you want this bad enough. There is really no reason to put off until tomorrow what you can do today. Worse case scenario, you fail, and end up taking it the next year anyways. My opinion: Anyone who passes with a year of studying could have done it in 4 months. That’s plenty of time to get through all the material and learn what you’re going to learn, before taking a stab at the exam.
I’m ready for a holiday now though. Finding it hard to concentrate at work.
I took level 1 in Dec’07 and level 2 in Jun. I think it’s 50-50 for me. Where is Dinesh? what are your thoughts on taking back to back CFA exams. Also, Dsylexic and Khabbi…one more exam in 6 months!!! it seems your guys enjoy exams pressure 
just joking.
Back to back for me. I’m ready for a vacation also … too bad I burned up a week of vacation days to study for L2! I’m not even sure how well I did. Like a lot of folks, I think I’m probably on the line: won’t pass by much, but won’t fail by much either.
I started studying for L2 in late march after passing L1 in December last year. I currently stand a 50-50 chance of passing. If it wasnt for me being sick the last few weeks, I would have been a pass. My point is that its very doable and not that much of a burnout really…May can be a bit sttressful but its only 1 month…April I did about 2 hours/day after work and 3-4 hours on the weekend…its quite surprising how quick one can go through shweser…
Passed in December and bought Schweser review materials which I didn’t get around to studying until late March due to business trips and medical issues. Eventually, when I did study, I spent too much time on useless stuff: FCFF/FCFE/Time Series. Anyways, I felt in December that I would be on the borderline of passing/failing and I feel the same now.
Rakesh, been catching up with life, so don’t login much to the forum… I did L1 in Dec-07 and L2 in Jun-08. I felt I was 1 month short in my preparation because I wasted 1 month after the L1 results and before registering for L2 due to some personal dishartening reasons. Registered and started studying for L2 on 1st March. 90 days later, from where I stand, I feel 40-60 PASS-FAIL ratio. Hope my guesses work and I pass come Aug-08
I gave L1 in dec 07, & L2 in jun… It all seems to me to be like a game of cricket. We may like 20-20 or we may like Test cricket. but we just go to know that the strategy may be different… come aug and we would know if the decision was right. … I hope it was… but then… Even if it wasnt, at the end of the day, I made the choice…if not anything -quite a few hours have already been put in… so it makes things easier later.
explain the cricket analogy for us yankee fans.
Well,I took December and got entirely burnt out along the line because I peaked too early.What actually distorted my plans was that 2 months to the exams,I started putting in 14hrs work day to enable me to finish a project that I was working on. Net,I think I was on the borderline of Pass/Fail. Hope I get the positive out of it.
petetini Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > explain the cricket analogy for us yankee fans. well… Test cricket spans for 5 days… so the strategy generally is not to loose wickets( not to be out)as long as you are out there Ones & twos also add to the total… like every drop counts while 20-20 is over in a jiffy…so strategy to score max runs quickly- you Do NOT have all the time in the world.(at the same time not loose too many wickets- but thats kind of secondary)- its do or die