To the point, when I qouted 1,000 hours, I was speaking in reference to the cumulative hours over the 3 levels, because obviously 1,000 hours for one level, is a bit crazy…Life is short I going to assume Equivocation meant the same
I think the subsequent poster meant 400 cumulative too. Level 1 is a breeze if you were a serious finance major as an undergrad.
1000 hours cumulative is probably on the high side.
At KarateBoy, You are actually right, I read it again, I shall depart this thread now in shame… Good day to you sir
400 all in seems light for the average person, given pass rates and effort. That’s about where I’ll be after L3 this June (350-400), but I also have a MS Finance I wrapped up in December so counting that it’s much more, and I consider myself on the light side.
MattLikesAnalysis Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > > If you think your analysts will actually spend 900 > hours studying for the CFA, you probably shouldn’t > hire them anyway. I don’t know about you but every > one of my self respecting friends got through the > program on 500 hrs max and most were closer to > 300-400. a small price to pay in order to build a > strong understanding of markets. I wouldn’t hire someone who wasted time trying to figure out exactly how many hours they studied. Why bother analyzing something that does nothing for you? Study until you got it. done.
Yeah, I really question the accuracy of any of those figures being thrown around. Did anybody really keep track?
I kept track roughly. I had a study plan that I kep track on. Probably within 5%.
I’ve got to think that’s unusual.
Probably. The guide was to keep me on pace. Keeping track has just been kind of a byproduct of that.
Intially I was drawn to the charter because I graduated with a liberal arts undergrad from a top tier university and I wanted to show interest in finance and credibility. Also the allure of stacking fat paper stacks in finance was compelling as well. Now after clearing two levels and sitting for level 3 for the second time this june I can say that my motivation has changed. I have faced significant frustrations in my career development, while studying for 1 & 2 I worked construction and did temp jobs to pay the bills. This was compounded by extremely challenging personal issues I had to overcome. Only recently have I been able to secure somewhat relevant employment. I must say that I have enjoyed the process, now more then I ever can I say that I love the material. I find finance and the CFA material to be intensely intellectually rewarding and dispite my continued career frustrations I will never ever give up the dream of having an intellectually challenging position within the capital markets.
Equivocation Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > See! This is what I hate. CFA curriculum dulls > people’s mind. EMH is wrong!! It is obvioulsy > wrong. Taleb Nassim and Mandelbrot completely > demolished it. > > CFA curriculum should be completely changed. > Simply drop everything that has a greek letter > attached. The Keynesian economics is also > useless. That probably is 30-50% of the > curriculum. > > Add in-depth history of financial markets. At > least two study sessions on trading indicators and > charting. Add two study sessions on non-obvious > trading strategies. Force people to read > Misbehaviour of Financial Markets and throw in > some Austrian economics (even if you disagree it > is now a widely studied approach to economics > which CFA’s have not the slightest clue) Your claims are untenable in light of empirical evidence, referencing Taleb and Mandelbrot who are first and foremost mathematicians has revealed you to be an ignorant ideologue.
bodhisattva Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Equivocation Wrote: > -------------------------------------------------- > ----- > > See! This is what I hate. CFA curriculum dulls > > people’s mind. EMH is wrong!! It is obvioulsy > > wrong. Taleb Nassim and Mandelbrot completely > > demolished it. > > > > CFA curriculum should be completely changed. > > Simply drop everything that has a greek letter > > attached. The Keynesian economics is also > > useless. That probably is 30-50% of the > > curriculum. > > > > Add in-depth history of financial markets. At > > least two study sessions on trading indicators > and > > charting. Add two study sessions on non-obvious > > trading strategies. Force people to read > > Misbehaviour of Financial Markets and throw in > > some Austrian economics (even if you disagree it > > is now a widely studied approach to economics > > which CFA’s have not the slightest clue) > Your claims are untenable in light of empirical > evidence, referencing Taleb and Mandelbrot who are > first and foremost mathematicians has revealed you > to be an ignorant ideologue. i bet you have crazy finance education, but not in finance.
I was drawn to the CFA to meet women.
I took the Level 1 while stuck in a dead end job in defense contracting. I paid out of pocket. Passing the Level 1 got me an interview for what would eventually become my first entry-level research analyst spot (Months later, I saw HR’s e-mail to my boss “This guy has a Level 1 CFA” with a resume attached – nothing else). A few years later, getting the charter got me my promotion into a senior role. I would not have been considered without it. Everyone on these board always harps on how “it’s not the only thing, you need experience etc. etc.” Who doesn’t know that by now? I don’t have an MBA, and may not ever need one. The job I’ve got now is the type of job I’d want to land if I graduated from a top school. Sure, I have a good degree and I interview well. Still, the CFA program has been instrumental to my career so far.
I think I studied like 450 hours for L1 (I had no finance education and went to a crappy school, plus I’m an idiot). Then like 600 for L2, but I was getting like 90’s on the sample exams, I was scared that if I failed L2, it’d mess with my focus and I’d fail future attempts as well, so I overstudied, but honestly I enjoyed the l2 material the most and the vibe our forum had going on that year. Then for l3, probably like 400. Maybe I just made myself look dumb, but I’ve always had a stubborn “work harder, not smarter” approach where I just kind of beat my head against obstacles till I break them. Not recommended.
“Do you really want to answer 120-240 problems in six hours that require you to create an answer for every possible contingency and inefficiency in the economy and markets? No, you assume markets are fairly efficient, unless the problem tells you that so-and-so has found that X will outperform Y through extra analysis, and then you practice the concept or idea that’s in the curriculum.” @bchadwick, Have you ever thought that it is not about getting the piece of paper? I would rather study 2000 hours if the subject matter was actually a reasonabe approximation of reality than study even 300 hours of material I know is wrong simply because it is the “orthodox” way of doing it (my personal guess is they don’t change the curriculum because they don’t have anything to with which to replace it) I am surprised by how well you memorized the CFA curriculum and by how little you consider the underlying basis for the theories you expouse. Come on think a little. Derivatives are fully dependent on an efficient market hypothesis, that is the definition of arbitrage pricing! Talk to commodity traders they will laugh if you tell them that markets are efficient and that you can setup a trade to capture that “risk-free” arbitrage. See how you can explain backwardation. CAPM is a TERRIBLE approximation of value. When I was writing valuation opinions, I could literally alter the value of a company by 50% and still have a legitimate defense for my valuation. What do you want me to manipulate? Betas? equity risk premiums? Small cap? Illiquidity? Just tell me the target value and I will get you there. The reason CAPM seems to work is only because appraisers adjust the inputs so as to provide for a “reasonable” cost of equity… but the whole purpose of using CAPM in the first place is supposed to be precisely to provide an unbiased quantitative valuation. In the end, it is just a way to add credibility to a pre-selected valuation. Next on economics. The topic is far more complex, and you probably have not read anything on the matter other than what is on the curriculum so there is not much to discuss. Suffice it to say, all economics schools covered in the CFA curriculum use Keynes as a base for their assumptions; even Monetarists use core Keynesian assumptions. In fact CFA really only presents you two schools; Keynesians and Monetarists. @MattLikesAnalysis Your credibility is suspect when you claim you can pass the entire CFA on 300 hours. But hey! I hope you are as smart as your friends. Let’s assume it is true what you say. 300 hours is not enough to read the curriculum. I would have to assume they only memorized the Schweser summaries. So in real terms your self-respecting friends know precious little about finance but they have a nice piece of paper stating that for a brief 3 month time span they memorized how to execute every equation in each level. About Austrian economics. It would be dogmatic of me to suggest to fully replace Keynesianism with the Austrian approach. However, in the curriculum it is not even mentioned, whilst highly controversial Keynesian concepts are left unquestioned. In conclusion. The curriculum is dogmatic, and does not reflect cutting edge knowledge. Make not mistake, I have learned a lot, and it was a great base to understand other financial approaches. However, has memorizing equations for 4 years been a good use of my time? Honestly not
@bodhisattva “Your claims are untenable in light of empirical evidence, referencing Taleb and Mandelbrot who are first and foremost mathematicians has revealed you to be an ignorant ideologue.” What? Do you even read academic papers? All the theories you are memorizing were made by Phd’s who were essentially mathematicians modelling financial markets. Mandelbrot just happened to be one of the most brilliant mathematicians of our century. When he tells you the mathematical model explaining markets is wrong, you should really listen. What empirical evidence are you talking about? The empirical evidence is that the theories don’t work.
The reason we learn pricing on normal distributions bud, is because the whole idea behind exponential curves in complex systems means we cannot use these theories to model. So yes, you learn the shortcomings, which are covered in the text, but at the end of the day, you need a model.
@Black Swan Yeah. I understand, and when talking to my boss I most definitely quote standard theory. It is the only way to appear respectable instead of saying that in a complex adaptative system bordering an inflection point anything can happen. Darn… in practice I even use rating agency reports (I cringe in shame). Problem is that we are fitting reality into a model because we have no other model. Standard financial theory as you probably know fits markets only when they are fluctuating within a stable state. In reality, complex dynamic systems do not fit at all into this normality assumption. Somewhat inaccurately, we could say that normality is a special case of chaos. So our models are like a broken watch. They will work perfectly exactly two times a day. Is such a model worth keeping? I don’t have the answers but I honestly thought that many more soon to be CFA’s would understand my point on the limited “real” value of what we have studied