CFA exams? anyone done them

boomboombazza

just looking for first hand experience on the CFA exams. are you doing them/have done them. have you any advice. what doors has doing this opened up etc.

i know there is loads of info on the interweb but i'm looking for personal accounts

cheers

damnyanks

Well I'm not sure about Ireland. I'm finishing up Level 1. It's fine - takes a good bit of time. My company has / will send me on about 3 weeks worth of class and bought me various study notes. Pretty confident (been doing practice exams and doing fine)

It will open doors up for you in investment management type roles. If you complete all 3 levels its a great achievment. Not many do it.

boomboombazza

damnyanks wrote: »

Well I'm not sure about Ireland. I'm finishing up Level 1. It's fine - takes a good bit of time. My company has / will send me on about 3 weeks worth of class and bought me various study notes. Pretty confident (been doing practice exams and doing fine)

It will open doors up for you in investment management type roles. If you complete all 3 levels its a great achievment. Not many do it.

cool. basically i graduated from college last year and now i'm a fund accountant which is ok for now but i need to broaden my horizons. you are a damn yank i take it working in yankville:D?

daveirl

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boomboombazza

do you think i could study for them while working full time or are they seriously hard?

mikemac

boomboombazza wrote: »

do you think i could study for them while working full time or are they seriously hard?

It's not that there are seriously hard, it's just the volume of work
There's two of us doing level 1 in December in London here in my workplace.
I've so so much to do yet

If you're not started yet boomboombazza or even gotten the manuals and curriculum yet you'll have to consider waiting for June 09 exams.

Latest pass rates:

CFA pass rates
Level I: 35% of 44,063 candidates
Level II: 46% of 33,449 candidates
Level III: 53% of 14,569 candidates

daveirl

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boomboombazza

daveirl wrote: »

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sounds like fun:o

edit: June 09 sounds like a plan. i think its cheaper to sign up for june 09 now than the december sitting too

henry hill

Where can you take these is Dublin, Ireland? Are there classes available?

I work in the IT Dept of an Investment company in Dublin and i would like to know more about the business side. i was looking at a "Diploma in Stockbroking Investment" in DPS as an introduction - anyone know anything about this course? http://www.portobello.ie/Evening%20Diploma%20Brochure%202007.pdf??

bridmwhite@gmai

I'm a CFA Charterholder. The exams are difficult (but easier than previously when there was no multiple choice) and you have to have a certain amount of experience in an investment role before you can receive the charter. There's a bulk factor in terms of the amount of information you need to cover and retain because levels 2 and 3 build directly on level 1.

i'm registered for the exam on the 6th in london.. not doin it tho didnt even try to study it so bad waste of 700euro

mikemac

Not to worry Ads by Google
20% of people who register don't attend so you're not alone.
I don't have a direct link for that but read it here:
http://www.analystforum.com/

You can go again in June 09 and there are only very minor changes in the material so any study you've done is not wasted.

Oh I paid for December 08 too in London but also not doing them, left it way too late. Yep, felt like a failure for a few days but raring to go for June 09.

Edit:
It's worth knowing they do Level 1 every December & June but Level 2 & 3 only in June.
A good plan (thinking way ahead here!) would be:

June 09: Level 1
June 10: Level 2
June 11: Level 3

Gives loadsa time but fail Level 2 or Level 3 and you're back a year so mega pressure

pretty much exactly my case with timing hopefully.. and im a member of analyst forum aswell.

what degree you have? im presuming you have one instead of the 4 years experience by the way..

mikemac

Deleted User wrote: »

what degree you have? im presuming you have one instead of the 4 years experience by the way..

Oh I did an IT degree (and I'm clueless with computers ) but did most of the quantitative stuff before but all the rest is new to me, especially the economics.

Don't have the 4 years experience either