C’mon be honest about this - you took the exam four times and didn’t even come very close to passing. The world of finance is much deeper than the CFA exams and you couldn’t even do the first one. Everybody would probably like to tell you that you can be great at doing due diligence (due diligence on what I wonder) but you just don’t know very much about finance and you likely never will. You’re right that I would hire a CFA charterholder instead of you for just about any job in finance. People here are taking the CFA exam so they can be in that group. Finance is aming the most competitive fields on earth. Why should someone want someone on their team who has just really proven that they don’t know anything about finance and can’t learn?
Joey-for the past year I’ve been doing due diligence on your wife!!
Joey, for someone so high and mighty, you sure sound novice. Manager DD is basically about evaluating the person not the numbers…its more of a psych/socio valuation than a financial assessment. You don’t need to know complexities of finance in order to do “human due diligence”. The reason JPM needs it is because as you do become more senior you have to pull the human evaluation together with the financials and make comparisons. Get the materials from your friends that took the CAIA JPM…Looking the material over should give you an idea of if its worth your time or not.
sorry, i didn’t mean it as pep talk if that’s the way you see it.
Sorry ebowsaah. I was just trying to get my point across. I do appreciate your input.
I completely disagree. You’re going to go talk to a manager and have no idea if what he is telling you is the truth because you dont even know finance to the level of CFA 1 (and you’re not smart enough to pass a not extraordinarily difficult exam after four tries)? I’ve been part of tons of hedge fund due diligence. If I sat down across from this guy and decided that I was using words he didn’t understand, he wouldn’t get much.
I concur - I know what they do and you do need to grow your knowledge pretty fast. Its not so much ‘human due diligence’ but if you don’t have a clue on what the fund manager is talking about, what chance do you have on assessing his/her ability to perform int he future? how do you assess his strategy? I reckon the CAIA is better for him… why? Because its likely in his field of work he’d encounter a whole bunch of guys investing in commodities etc etc
JoeyDVivre is right on. You people saying he’s mean and harsh probably don’t work in finance, work in some back office, or just don’t have any real experience. People who work in this industry and have passed L2 and L3 know that L1 is an utter joke. Yes, manager due diligence doesn’t require much analytical work, but L1 is about the absolute basics of finance, it doesn’t even get to the real valuation or IPS work. I would call L1 a minimum requirement for a basic foundation to the world of finance. Failing one or two times MAY be understandable (life happens), but 4 times? I think you do need to rethink finance. What will likely happen if you stay with your fund-of-funds job is that you’ll be stuck as a junior guy forever. If your fund hangs in there, you’ll stay. If the fund craters, you’re in trouble. less than 100k charterholders TOTAL in the world now, sure it’s an elite club.
I’ve been doing this job for over 10 years. It has quantitative and qualitative aspects. You need to understand what the manager does and how they do it as well as the attribution and the statistics. This involves lots of writing-research reports and presentations. I scored highest on quant and portfolio management on the CFA. I was weak on accounting. Hedge fund DD is a different animal. This is more difficult for several reasons such as the operational DD involved and the exotic strategies the manager employs. Regarding the CFA for this job, many DD analysts have the charter-especially as they become more senior.
OK-I came here for advice, so I got it. I haven’t written off a career change. What I struggle with most is what that would be.
jpm, I believe the most important issue of this thread is the Time Constraint issue…please describe your problem. Hopefully, we can help you with it, at the very least we should be able to generate mulitple suggestions. W
Last June, in the morning exam I ran short on time and had to fill in about 12-15 problems in 1-2 min. In the afternoon session, I monitored my time much closer, but I was still right up to the final second. It’s not just the time. I think my problem is test anxiety. I tend to freak out on exam day.
jpm, Did you complete all of the material followed up with a 4 to 6 week review? Normally, test anxiety comes from not being fully prepared. W
I completed all the material with a 4 week review. I used a combination of CFAI and Shweser materials. I started studying just after Thanksgiving.
Use The study strategy below from now until the June Exam plus 45 minutes a day of Schweser 120 question exams (with basic/intermediate/advanced questions) with every study session. Identify the deltas between the 2011 and 2012 LOS on the Finquiz website. 1.» review all summaries from all books 2.» redo all exercices from all books 3.» perform mock-exams (when available in March) 4.» review your areas of weaknesses (identified with mock-exams and redone exercices) 5.» perform sample exams (when available in April ?) 6.» review all summaries from all books 7.» you’re ready! Whatever your profile is (full time|part time), you should try your best to avoid ‘learn & forget’ effect. Do the following: » study regularly (every days – even if it’s just to review already learned content) » prior to starting your new readings, review the (summary of) last 3 readings (ie. a moving average) » each time you finish a book, review all readings within all previously finished books (recently finished one included) » redo all the exercises from the entire book finished right before recently finished book Do your best not to be late on your schedule, otherwise it will hard to catch up. Well, that being said, good luck.
be warned that L2 is far more difficult and quantitative. If you want a sample of the differences, look in this thread http://www.analystforum.com/forums/cfa-forums/cfa-level-ii-forum/91015512
Do the CAIA program, a lot more value, less stress, more useful learning, well accepted in the industry… even enjoyable. You won’t make it through L2 or L3. L2 is about 2.5x harder than L1. L3 is another beast. The CFP is also a quality program.
stop crying and step up and pass the exam. I thought the Lv1 exam was a joke- that being said, i spent 5 months hard studying. Lack of effort on your part. Nothing is impossible. And noting is impossible to learn. If i wanted to be a doctor I could, It would just take me years to learn it. If you want to hold the CFA charter, take the time and learn it! See ya
Maybe you should think if finance is really a field suited for you? If you have already failed CFA level 1 four times, how will you pass level 2 and level 3, which are considered much harder? You might end up wasting a lot more years trying to get the CFA and still not get it. Why not try something else like an MBA ?
JPM, I am myself in no position to dish out advice I still have yet to graduate from college and write for Level 1. But if you think about it, alot of people have failed twice as much as you in their respective fields before they found success. The point is that they didn’t give up. Sure, the road may be harder for you and maybe for me too but at the end of the day, you didn’t get in the position you in are in today because you’re dumb. Ask yourself if you really put in the 110% effort to pass Level 1? Only you can answer that.