Am was terrible for me. I agree with Agida99 that it was way harder than the past exams. and 2009 paper was a doddle compared.
Like LeGrandeFinale there were 20 points I didn’t even get a chance to write on the AM section. I knew I was running late and figured I’d save the options for last since I could just write equations until time expired, but time was called as I turned to the section. I’ve been beating myself up ever since. I got behind on question 1, mistake #1, then realized that taxes had already been deducted from the education expenses and went back to redo the calculations and double check all of the information in the problem, mistake #2. I can’t believe I screwed it up by leaving so many points on the table. I couldn’t get out of my head from the 30 min mark battling the clock but not wanting to make any more attention to detail mistakes. I feel like such a jackass after spending so much time to nail down the concepts and F-ing it up because of stupid mistakes and time management. I actually got home and apologized to my wife. Can someone post the wiki link? After a brief period of grieving and angst, I want to get to work on next year. I might as well start by typing up my notes and posting them there. I can do that before I get the new curriculum. I agree that other than the time allotted for AM section, the exam was fair and a little less challenging than 2009, and the practice tests provided. I don’t feel that it was a good reflection of my abilities or knowledge of the curriculum because of the mind games that resulted from the time crunch in the AM section, but I suppose that is all part of it.
I agree with alle - I think the AM was a 3.5 - 4 hour exam. PM seemed easy, though I could have gotten a few stupid ones wrong.
I thought the exam was difficult but fair. I kept realizing little mistakes I made on the return calc on Q1 so kept having to revise. Took me about 50 minutes, but I figured I could make up the 20 minutes easily enough. Yeah right. I was under the gun the whole session, really had to fight to keep my composure and just calmly answer each question. That was key - composure. I felt better walking out of this than I did for either Level I or II.
Looks like AF is functioning again. I left the last part of individual IPS nearly 100% blank … Also the first part of what Treasury Bond I didn’t answer…The only reason is those two were the questions I skipped over and never got around to it…I think they were 8 and 7 points respectively?
AM really threw me for a loop. ended up finishing all sections but with only 5 min to spare. was in a state of shock when time was called because my heart had been racing for the last hour and on sheer volume alone, it was sig harder than any practice AM i had done i can see how others say PM was easy. i finished at around the 90 min mark. but i took my time going over most of the questions in the remaining time and realized just how nuanced/tricky so many of them were. ended up changing quite a few responses. there were a large handful that seemed super obvious at first (<10 seconds or less each) in my first go around, but after a careful reading i realized i had jumped the gun initially. passed levels 1 and 2 on first attempt without any real concern about passing. i am crapping myself this time, though.
feel a little bit better now. pretty much everybody feels the same way. killing am, easy pm. i am pretty sure i failed. now i am thinking of next year. i am a little bit surprised that schweser is way off this time. like the tax question and the equity performance question, i have never seen anything similar in schweser books. i may think of switching exam preparer next year. any recommendations?
those tax questions anal raped me…thats for sure…just because of those…i think i fucked up big time
I’d recommend the CFAI curriculum lol. I honestly think that the 3rd party preparers are a waste of money at Level III… I could see some benefit in the earlier levels due to the material being so much more objective. On LIII you’re depending on their interpretation of the CFAI’s guidelines and their asssessment of how important each topic is.
double posted
I share the sentiment that the AM was a time crunch, but ultimately pretty fair. The PM was brutal. I’m with californiamba, I think it was a lot trickier than I expected. I had about an hour extra in the PM to go back and review my answers and I also found several tricks that I didn’t notice on the first pass. I hope my second pass improved my score and didn’t just cause me to overthink the problems.
askajan, I read the swaps readings in the CFAI text and worked some currency problems on Friday night expecting something like that. It was basically asking you to identify the currency premium/discount. I agree that while CFAI was much more direct in the Ethics questions, this was one area where it was really difficult to discern what the hell was being asked.
What a relief that I wasn’t the only one who had time management issues in the AM! I never had any time issues taking any practice exams, but knew I was in trouble when I realized it took me more than an hour to get through questions 1-3, and I had left the tax BS question blank. I feel good about the PM session, so fingers crossed that it pulls my rotten AM score up.
Before I started the morning, I wrote down the expected time to finish each question in my book, eg 9:40 for problem 1 etc. then I stuck to it. I ended up with 5 extra minutes which I used to review my answers, only to find that I had missed part D of a question as it was buried on the back of a page! frantically wrote down the formula and they called time. I also wasted WAY too much time on the tax, but at least I answered everything. I thought the afternoon was easy except for one or two questions… I used the curriculum. Currency killed me. I finished early, but stayed to check my answers and found three mistakes so glad I reviewed. Stupid things like answering the question for the “most appropriate” action when the question ACTUALLY asked for the “least appropriate”…
sorry but what is this tax question that everyone is on about? i dont remember anythind tax related sticking out from am - either i missed it entirely or didnt think it was hard enough to remember…can anyone remind me?
I charged like crazy in the am, and although I did (just) make it through, I know I made mistakes. I’ve realized some of the mistakes since and am really kicking myself now. It would have been helpful to have had some time to think about what I was actually doing. The afternoon seemed decent. I worked through it, think I caught some of the curve balls, but as with these exams, I’m always left wondering what I missed. Unfortunately I developed an uncharacteristic and intense headache in the PM session. I think I was able to work through it though. I really don’t know right now… Like everyone else, I really hope I passed, but I just don’t know… Still don’t know where I stand on the usefullness of Schweser. I found after reading the CFAI texts, reviewing with Schweser DID help put it all together for me, but there is just so much detail in the curriculum… If I have to do this again, I definitely will re-read and re-read CFAI… Ah well, now for another summer of purgatory waiting for results…
I had about 30 minutes to spare. Then I relaxed (wasn’t allowed to leave anymore anyway) and then started my second review. Did that slowly since i had plenty of time. Then I got to question 9 with about 5 minutes left. Read that it had four parts… four? There is a D? I only did it up until C! Where the hell is D? Ow… it’s on the back of the page and even though I had plenty of time before I still suddenly had to rush… Really annoying. Fortunately it was just a three minute question but to help myself I read it wrong the first time. So I was answering a question they weren’t asking. Think I finally did answer it correctly though but my god. Way to give a guy a heart attack. 
wtf…the questions had a, b, c, d, e…
I felt exactly the opposite of most on here - thought the AM was a breeze and the PM was tricky. No time issues for either one (done the AM with 1/2 hour to spare, PM left at about 3:30). We’ll see what happens - g’luck everybody.
AM questions were short on Breadth, but long on Depth. each section had a A B C D it seemed