What topic/reading/los/whatever was (is) the most difficult to you while you were (are) preparing to your CFA level 1 examination? For all those who already sat the exam - what are you most unsure about?
I sat the exam in december and I found SS9 by far the hardest topic to study for (The deferred taxes and lease topics were hard to comprehend). The questions I found hardest in the exam though were the ethics ones. I could usually narrow it down to 2 choices but I was hardly ever sure I was picking the correct answer. Good luck for your studies.
I guess it depends on your background. But I do think FSA is challenging in the fact that it is loooong and booooring. Although once you understand it, it makes a lot of sense.
i must agree with you about SS9. OMG
FSA is the hardest area for Level I.
ethics has the trickiest q’s
FSA was the easiest section. I was expecting much much more difficult questions in FSA. I would def agree that Ethics was tricky in the PM, Equity Valuation and some Corp Finance questions. Fixed income wasn’t that bad surprisingly but I guess we will wait and see come Jan 28 how much my feelings match the grades
FSA taxes, don’t think anyone actually paid attention to that chapter. Ethics was consistently easiest for me but come test day was much trickier than the practices I’ve been doing!
FSA was a bitch to study for (it made me stop studying for 3 months because I hated it so much), but the questions on the exam were really easy.
SS9
What was so hard about SS9? There’s the difference between LIFO/FIFO, very easy Long lived assets… difference between depreciation methods, impairments, etc… also very easy stuff Analysis of income tax… that was a bit difficult Financing liabilities… some of the amortization of bond discounts / premiums stuff might’ve been a bit hard to understand. Operating vs capital leases… again, basic stuff. The only thing in SS9 that was remotely challenging was the tax stuff and parts of financing liabilities
income taxes, financing liabilities and leases were pretty hard probably because i have no background in accounting everything else on the exam was pretty straightforward
i agree with everyone that SS9, especially taxes and certain parts of leases were the most annoying, but i thought the ethics questions were MUCH more retarded than the FSA ones on the exam
Agree that SS9 is a pain on the wrong side. From engineering background and just began reading for the exam in Dec. Began SS9 this morning and nearly collapsed…
SS9 is one of those topics that is better understood when you work with someone on it. Why do i say this? The first time i sat for the exam, i went in there really not knowing much about FSA. I read from cover to cover CFAI books but, it wasnt clicking in. For december, i once again worked on it for it was my weakest area. I did it with a friend who was an accountant. And, after i did problem through problem in the books, along with scweser material. It really made alot of sense. it just “clicked.” At the same time, i participated alot more here in the forums after june. so reading alot of the smart posts here made me challenge myself to try and keep up with everyone else. These AFers are pretty smart. eh… some of them.
FSA has eaten up much of my prep time, especially leasing and deffered taxes. I find it frustrating as I spent so much time and during the exam not many questions were from the topics I really toiled on. i deliberately started with the most difficult and unpleasent section (for me fsa). But I ran out of time and had to rely on my background to answer Corp, Deriva and math. Ethics was really tricky so I spent very little time (during exam). I relied on “common sense” during the exam. While prep I used Q-bank, and ethics questions were long, so for me as not a native speaker it was a bit daunting. Let’s wait and see, success to you all bros and sisters!
No argument here, FSA is by far my weakest section. I don’t know if I would agree as SS9 being the hardest topic overall…but that’s because i’m not done my review.