Bad News

I actually did no study yesterday. Mainly because I was too tired when I got home from university. I made up 1 hour today, but now I'm actually worried about the amount of time I've set aside from each topic.

As I said before, the CFAI recommends 10-15 hours a week learning one study session. Today I was surfing the net and found a guide to passing the level 1 exam. Based on a 300 hour study schedule, it suggests spending 45 hours studying ethical and professional standards! Wow, that's alot more than 15..

I can understand it though...With the study this week (2 hours), and study before then (about 10 hours), I've gone through 65 of the 167 pages of the first study session which covers all the ethical and professional standards. Realistically, it would probably take 45 hours to go through all of it and do questions. However, at the moment I cannot increase my study time for the CFA exam because of the assignments due for university. I will continue along for the meantime and pump up the number of study hours at the end of June.

Other points of interest in the guide were the pass rates for the level exams. In 2004 they were 34% for level 1, 32% for level 2, and 64% for level 3. I'm sure the pass rates are very similar today. It goes to show you cannot breeze through this. To be safe, you need to get 70% or over to ensure a pass (no one who's got over that has failed). It's also a good indicator that people who pass the CFA exams 'know their stuff,' and clients can reliably trust them to act in a competent, ethical manner. Do you agree?

Financial statement analysis and corporate finance makes up 28% of the exam which makes them important topics. Ethical and professional standards make up 15% of the exam but are featured in all 3 exams, so it's important to learn it well now.

There's alot more useful information in the guide, so if you're sitting the exam in June or December, it's definitely worth a read. How are your studies going? Did you spend that many hours on each topic? Or substantially less? Let me know, and good luck with your studies.

214 days until the level 1 exam.