Anybody done CFA?

Desperado

Desperado

Desperado

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14 Aug 2014
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Hi all,

Just checking if there are any finance bods among us. I'm just about to start CFA Level 1 and wondering if anybody has done it or is currently studying toward the December exam. I just got my study materials through the post (an enormous box full of textbooks and a scientific calculator, joy). I've had a look through the curriculum and am only dreading the corporate finance bit, I've never been particularly strong at reading financial statements, balance sheets, knowing the different accounting ratios etc so will probably end up spending an inordinate amount of time on that.

The exam seems to be 6 hours long with an hour break in the middle. How tough is it all? I'm now all paid up to Level 3 with my chosen training provider which should keep me busy and out of the pub until June 2016. :D

Any pointers or inside knowledge on what to do/where to spend time are greatly appreciated!
 
Did level one about two years ago its tougher than you first think the sheer volume of information you have to learn is crazy unless you have a great memory or loads of time to study you are cutting it fine starting now!

Exam tips - play close attention to the wording of the question and do every calculation twice they always put common calc errors as answers
 
Finished my ACA exams a few months back and they were pretty hard, but from what I've heard CFA is ridiculous in comparison :o

Fun statistic I just read off Wiki:

From 1963-2012, a total of 950,221 candidates have sat for the Level I exam, with 152,035 candidates ultimately going on to pass the Level III exam, representing a weighted average completion rate of 16%.
Click to expand...

Good luck! :p
 
I have been asked by my employer to do it many times but I cannot dedicate the time to passing it. People put a ridiculous amount of hours in to it and pretty much write off 6 months of their life.

Nice bonus at the end of it too but I really don't have much interest in seeing it through.
 
I've not done CFA but have seen a colleagues level 1 and 2 notes... none of it seems to be particularly complicated or deep - the main issue is that it is very broad. Have fun spending hundreds of hours rote learning 'stuff'... It is well respected as lots of people drop out of the process or have to retake exams.
 
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