TheHiddenFlask

Cut it into 10 slices. I'm extra hungry today.

#dicksout for Harambe

Cashiers check

Each level is different.

L1 is all standalone multiple choice and 240 questions given over 2, 3 hour, sessions. It focuses on mastery of basic concepts by pushing volume. You don't have much time to sit around and think about any single question, so you have to know the material well.

L2 is 120 questions, given in 6 question vignettes over 2, 3 hour sessions. The concepts become more abstract and complicated, but since there are only half as many questions, you have less time pressure.

L3 is 9 to 11 questions that require short answer/essay responses in the three hour morning session. The test (as all levels are) is only given in English and must be answered in English, which is an added degree of difficulty for ESL test takers. The afternoon section is 60 multiple choice. The morning session is difficult to finish, but the afternoon session is easy to finish. The concepts become very abstract and the essay questions make you band together knowledge from several parts of the curriculum to get the right answer.

I took L3 with a guy that also took the LA Bar and he said that L3 by itself was significantly harder than the LA Bar, for reference. I dated a girl that went through law school and passed the MPRE and Bar on the first try. The MPRE is a joke. More comparable to the series 7. The bar was a lot of work, but you spent the 3 years of your life before that prepping for it and then studied full time for a couple of months right before the test. The colume of the Bar prep books was about the same volume as each level of the CFA. The difference here is that most people studying for the CFA are employed full time and studying in the evenings.

The exams are offered once a year, the first weekend in June. They recently added a December test for L1 only, but that was after I started the process.

You have 5 years between passes. It doesn't matter if you attempt the exam or not.

About 5 times higher than the CFA...

quote:

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But when you take other tests, you know what score you want/need. The CFA minimum passing scores are set after the tests are taken. Imagine getting a 75 on a test and thinking you passed... until you see the minimum passing score is 76, for example. I'd probably still compare the CFA to the CPA or CFP, though.

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They basically guarantee you that a 70% is passing. They just don't tell you exactly what it is to avoid people overfocusing on mock exam scores and to retain their ability to over/under weight questions once they get their results. Being an annual exam, they don't have the luxury of continuous feedback like the CPA exam does.

This article is the epitome of what the average piece of "journalism" in the Huffington Post is:

Someone who failed at their career and instead of getting back up and trying to make it decided to become a whining quasi journalist masquerading as a defender of the downtrodden, when they are, in fact, doing nothing but trying to build themselves up.

As I read this article, all I could think is that it sounded like someone who was failed the first level and then took his ball and went home. After a quick google search, I confirmed:

Lewis Krell is a former investment analyst turned tech employee and journalist. When his former employer asked him to take CFA Level I, he obliged – to begin with. And then he dropped out and gave up. Now he’s becoming known for voicing his opinion that the CFA exams are a waste of time.
-eFinancialCareers

The first five points in his 6 point arguments are demonstrably false and the last point (that it causes brilliant people to funnel into finance because the CFA makes it so easy to get on the fast track to a high paying position) is antithetical to his title assertion that it is a scam.

The site won't let me copy and paste, but here are a few highlights of where he is wrong:

-There are prerequisites (having a college degree and additionally 4 years relevant work experience).

-You can't take it however many times you want. You have to pass your next exam within 5 years of your most recent pass. So, unless you want to start the entire series over again multiple times, you have to get serious about taking the exams, especially since they are only offered once a year.

- Attorneys and doctors can take the MCAT and LSAT multiple times, but he's trying to draw a false comparison. The comparable certificates would be the Bar exam and medical boards, which can all be taken more times without repercussions than level 2 and 3 of the CFA.

- He doesn't even justify his claim that the CFA has no incentive to maintain membership quality because even mental gymnastics can't make that seem sensible.

- His assertion that there is no human interaction is absurd. By the time I got to level 3, I knew about 25% of the people taking the exam with me in New Orleans. Maybe that is why he failed.

- The CFA does not give a black and white version of the world. Level 1 does, because it is filled with well established fact, something the author couldn't quite wrap his mind around. By the time you get to L3, you are studying the softer side of finance, like behavioral finance.

- The CFA was an incredibly humbling experience for me and I imagine it is for almost everyone. Although I could see how his remarkably limited experience with Level 1 could lead him to that opinion, level 2, which tests in vignettes, and level 3, which adds a written portion, is impossible to memorize. It's all about learning the overarching themes and effectively playing the numbers game to get above that mystical and undefined rate needed to pass. I'm sure some guy pulled a rainman and annihilated level 3, but everyone I knew, after years and years of preparation for that test day, and a lifetime of intellectual success stories that were easy to come by, walked out of the test feeling somewhere between "I know I failed" and "I might not have failed."

What really makes me mad is that he's one of those idiots that knows enough to sound legit, but in reality, he's further off than people who just know nothing and admit it.

/rant

TL;DR - Old boy couldn't pass the easiest part of the CFA so instead of having the appropriate shame, he decided to demonize the institution.

This didn't get much play on the PT, probably because it's really an MT topic.

LINK

What geotag?

Banks that want to be big aren't risk free.

Deposits are not cheap to hold.

Why would a six figure loss be irrelevant just because everything else went to hell too?