what i learned on Level I and Level II have ABSOLUTELY helped me in my ER job …anyone who says otherwise is just trying to play it down because of an ego problem. its almost like saying where you go to undergrad is meaningless, which is absolutely not the case.
lets push this bad boy to 10 pages
wake2000 Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > lets push this bad boy to 10 pages ^^^push^^^
I see more MBA in SS ER than CFAs. So obviously MBA>CFA
man, I cant believe the CFA didnt teach me how to perform my job, what a shame I wasted all this time and money on these stupid tests
morons - if you’re looking for roi google ‘pajama jeans.’
so, MBA or CFA?
Step 1: Become a CFA Step 2: Using excellent stock picking and market beating skills acquired in CFA, buy pajama jeans Step 3: ??? Step 4: Profit
snuggie >>> pajama jeans. How about pajama jeans with “C.F.A.” sewed across the @$$?
Thread summary: 1. Having the CFA will likely not help much in your daily job. 2. Having the CFA often bolsters your standing when interviewing for a job. I don’t think anyone is arguing strongly against these points. Much of what anyone does for a living is learned on the job and not in the classroom. Kinda hard to find a program specifically tailored to such a diverse and dynamic field, it’s not like becoming a plumber or electrician (or CPA for that matter…) Likewise, few employers will rip up a resume or move it to the bottom of the pile because it says “CFA” on it. Therefore, those already with jobs don’t realize any value for the annual dues, especially as newly-gained knowledge comes from experience and self-study rather than CFA curriculum. However, look at the cohort of those studying for the exams - probably >80% in their 20s. They are looking for a job, not trying to make work a breeze once they get a job. Additionally, in this economy there’s no guarantee even a top MBA will get you a solid job, and going six-figures into debt is a lot riskier than a few thousand for the CFA. Getting the CFA is a relative bargain, and while it doesn’t guarantee anything, the fact that this debate exists proves it has some merit. Basically CFA doesn’t imply success, securing a job, results, etc, but having a CFA certainly shows you’re not an idiot who got past round 1 via school reputation or nepotism. It puts Joe Schmo from No-Name U on a more equal footing with Bob Silverspoon-in-mouth from Harvard undergrad (and potentially above for underdog-loving HRs). If I was unemployed for a year soliciting proprietary research reports without success I’d wish I’d spent time working on something more tangible and industry-recognized.
^ well said. The simple fact is, the CFA is seen by most professionals in finance as valuable. Regardless of its direct application to your specific job, the foundation of knowledge it provides is highly relevant. It’s become a status. Like people who graduated from Harvard, doesn’t prove you’re brilliant or smart, but you did manage to achieve it, and there’s something to admire about that. Whether it be hoping to land that FO job you want, or to gain more respect among professionals & your peers, it can only help you.
Interesting thread! Overall I would say some very good arguments were presented. However, I would like to point out that bromion is a very credible member of AF. I have a lot of respect for him and he has contributed with some valuable posts consistently on this forum. This should be a platform for mature professionals to have healthy discussions, despite a difference in opinions. In fact, difference of opinion is very important from a learning standpoint. But when someone with a serious identity crisis with no substantial contribution comes in here and starts calling names to a member like bromion, the decline in the standards of this forum becomes very evident. I hope BChad is taking note of this. This platform has been utilized to bounce-off useful ideas from some intelligent minds and difference of opinions has been welcomed in the past. Please don’t make this a stone-pelting event. That’s all I have to say!
Did I attack Bromion? Are you using me as the example of the decayed standards on this forum? I disagreed with bromion, but I didn’t attack him. Whereas some people were saying that the curriculum is useless, other than for getting interviews; I merely pointed out that plenty of things that we learn seem useless when we apply that knowledge to one set of tasks, like ER; but when we plan to have a career in an industry, we need a broader view. My point was that people who took bromion’s point of view were missing the bigger picture, which that a finance career involves more than just doing ER for 40 years. I have nothing against bromion personally and his posts are definitely more informed and thoughtful than most, even if I disagree with some of them. Whatever. I find the decay on this forum to really have started about a year or two ago when one couldn’t have a much of a serious discussion about anything without it degenerating into a p!ssing match about who Nupps had slept with that weekend or decade or JTLD telling KarenC what position he wanted to take her in and crap like that. I figured that it might just be a temporary thing and that as CFA season ramped up things would get more serious again. It did, but not that much, and then it all fell apart after the June exams again. And I think that a lot of the quality posters just got fed up with this stuff and left. I can see JDV’s rationale. I’m sure that a lot of people here are just frustrated and angry about a lot of stuff, now that the industry isn’t the free-for-all that it was earlier in the decade. I am frustrated too, for various reasons. Some people feel that all they need to do to be correct is to assert their points with confidence, and so you get things like “CFA is useless stuff, because it didn’t teach me VLOOKUP, and I need VLOOKUP in my job much more than writing up an IPS statement.” To me it sounds like my 9 year old stepdaughter telling me she doesn’t need to learn long division, because we have calculators now, and what she really needs to learn is to choose clothes because the richest people are in fashion design. To some extent, she’s not incorrect that most of the time we use calculators for difficult division problems, but we also know that learning long division is something useful and that people who can’t do it or don’t have the intuitions that come from knowing how to do it are just not going to be the ones we choose to promote to more responsible positions, except if you are the 1 in 10,000 or how ever many people who actually make it as a fashion designer.
Without bchadwick, this whole forum is trash as far as I’m concerned.
Dreary Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Without bchadwick, this whole forum is trash as > far as I’m concerned. congrats - you’re part of it pal
wake2000 Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > This thread blows a load. Blackbelt would not have > even been looked at had he not passed L2 after > studying 1000 hours for it yet has the nerve to > disregard the usefulness of the designation FYI, for my first round of interviewing, they didn’t even notice that I had L2 candidate on my resume. It wasn’t until the second round that the head of research even noticed it at the bottom. Second, I was a L2 CANDIDATE at the time I got hired. I found out I passed the day I started. iteracom Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > ^ I totally agree. OP you are the biggest > hypocrite ever. I went through search and dug up > YOUR OWN POST: > > These are YOUR OWN WORDS: > > CFABLACKBELT Wrote: > -------------------------------------------------- > ----- > > IMO it depends. Studying for the CFA has given > me > > a solid base in finance in ways that my college > > degree never could even come close to. The CFA > > also helped me land my research gig. It was by > no > > means a major factor, but def. helped weed me > out > > from the rest of the crowd. > > > > What a complete waste college was… > > > So now that you’re in the industry (thanks to your > painful CFA studying) you now say how “useless the > CFA is”. It GOT you the job, and you turn around > and trash talk it? > > Just get out. My original post did not focus on this. It was more so on the material being unwiedly. For a good solid month I tried using the material when reading 10K’s and such. The curriculum helped explain a lot of little items here and there, but at the end of the day the amount of time this took was just way too much and I really didn’t get the bigger picture. I never said it couldn’t help you get a job, nor implied that. My personal opinion though is that the CFA represents a high opportunity cost that I only have recently realized.
CFABLACKBELT Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > wake2000 Wrote: > -------------------------------------------------- > ----- > > This thread blows a load. Blackbelt would not > have > > even been looked at had he not passed L2 after > > studying 1000 hours for it yet has the nerve to > > disregard the usefulness of the designation > > > FYI, for my first round of interviewing, they > didn’t even notice that I had L2 candidate on my > resume. It wasn’t until the second round that the > head of research even noticed it at the bottom. > Second, I was a L2 CANDIDATE at the time I got > hired. I found out I passed the day I started. > > > > iteracom Wrote: > -------------------------------------------------- > ----- > > ^ I totally agree. OP you are the biggest > > hypocrite ever. I went through search and dug > up > > YOUR OWN POST: > > > > These are YOUR OWN WORDS: > > > > CFABLACKBELT Wrote: > > > -------------------------------------------------- > > > ----- > > > IMO it depends. Studying for the CFA has > given > > me > > > a solid base in finance in ways that my > college > > > degree never could even come close to. The > CFA > > > also helped me land my research gig. It was > by > > no > > > means a major factor, but def. helped weed me > > out > > > from the rest of the crowd. > > > > > > What a complete waste college was… > > > > > > So now that you’re in the industry (thanks to > your > > painful CFA studying) you now say how “useless > the > > CFA is”. It GOT you the job, and you turn > around > > and trash talk it? > > > > Just get out. > > > My original post did not focus on this. It was > more so on the material being unwiedly. For a > good solid month I tried using the material when > reading 10K’s and such. The curriculum helped > explain a lot of little items here and there, but > at the end of the day the amount of time this took > was just way too much and I really didn’t get the > bigger picture. > > I never said it couldn’t help you get a job, nor > implied that. My personal opinion though is that > the CFA represents a high opportunity cost that I > only have recently realized. Opportunity cost? what would you do INSTEAD of CFA? How can you measure CFA opportunity cost without alternatives?
CFABLACKBELT Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- i agree with you. the tests don’t really dig that deeply into any of the topics. look at swaps, structures and accounting - it could be much worse, but the purpose it to get that general knowledge to people who are ‘supposed’ to know these things. otherwise you could have a firm of happy-hands publishing whatever ratings their clients want.
push it to the limit
bchadwick Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Did I attack Bromion? Are you using me as the > example of the decayed standards on this forum? > Actually I thought both of your posts were very well written, especially the one about men enlisting… If you go back a couple of pages, you’ll see the attacks. Your posts are very informative and well-written almost all of the times. Read my post again.