I’m not sure why anyone would choose to punt on topics that will almost certainly appear on the exam. Plus, pensions and swaps and two concepts that, while seemingly complicated on the surface, will all of sudden click and you’ll just ‘get it’ if you study them enough. Anyone ready to punt on either pensions or swaps, I would say study just a bit more and because once you’ve got it…you’ve got it.
Agree, punting on pensions and swaps is seriously a stupid plan. The are predominantly part of the cirriculum in L2 and L3 (just swaps).
That said, I punted on Portfolio Management and Alts for L2, didnt even open the book. I *heavily* emphasized the heavy weighted topics, Equity, FRA, FI, and Ethics. That alone is >60% of the test. I ended up scoring >70 in those four with four <50 and passed. I think my 40/60/80 score was 68-70 so it was a pretty comfortable beat in my book.
TLDR: only punt if you are going to nail the important parts, overall its a high risk strategy to shine a whole section, but it’s smart time management to “pick you battles” when studying. The big four are the battles for L2.
Just wanted to get back to this topic. I’d just add if you know exactly what your strategy is and you stick to it religously, there are topics that are puntable. I punted a particular topic, didnt open a single page (seriously) and passed comfortably. I was very weak in the topic and knew the amount of time needed to bring up my performance could be better utilized mastering other more heavily weighted topic. However, I would advice not to punt more than one Topic.
Felicitation! You had bought a lotto ticket (by punting a topic) and you won.
^ I would agree with you if it was a borderline pass. But after estimating my 40/60/80 score, as well as gauging the MPS from other ppls results on here, It was a comfortable pass. So that analogy doesnt work.
The pain of studying all topics thoroughly is FAR FAR Less than the pain of failing because of something you didn’t study thoroughly or failing because of something you didn’t study at all.
With all due respect: for the average candidate, no topic areas are puntable.
Count your blessings.
One thing I learned in reading through these boards is that approaches are different even among successful candidates. I have seen advice that I definitely would not give to other candidates, but these people apparently passed just fine.
Like I said earlier in the thread, I see nothing wrong with skipping individual topics, or better said parts of topics… I did so myself both on the CPA Exam and the CFA Exam. Not all topics deserve the same effort, IMO.
I will give specific examples: On economics, I skipped the MTM pricing of a foreign currency forward contract. it required memorization and a calculation that I didn’t want to do. But, in exchange (pun intended) I was completely ready for anything Taylor rule, or Mundell-Flemming, or the neoclassical v endogenous growth theory.
For options, I totally knew put-call parity and the components of Black Scholes (and the direction a change in each component would have on option price) but knew little else. For swaps, I made absolutely sure I knew the difference between payer and receiver side,and the big idea behind swaps being similar to a series of forward contracts. I sacrificed the calculations…
To me,this is basic prioritization. Some topics I really focused on and others I was basically bullet proof. I believe I had many 5/6 and 6/6 item sets which got me over the finish line in L2 with a decent amount of room to spare.
Agree with most of the above … Learn everything, never assume. If you know these areas it puts you in a great frame of mind for the rest of the exam and your stronger areas.
exactly