CFA Level 1 Prep

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istudy

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A few questions regarding my prep:- (giving it next year - but preparing using the 2014 curriculum the differences between the 2015 and 2014 are very few - the changes can be covered easily within 2 months)
1. I intend to do all the questions in 4 undergrad finance books:- (this is just to get practice with the calculations and finance in general so that I do not waste any CFA questions, also so that I can learn to use the Calculator, though I do realise that the questions in the books below are different) - will leave these books the moment I find them useless in terms of practice and move on to the next steps
a. Ross Westerfield - Fundamentals of Corporate Finance
b. Van Horne - Fundamentals of Financial Management
c. Brigham - Financial Management Theory & Practice
d. Rielly - Investment Analysis and Portfolio Management
2. Next I will move onto Kaplan practice questions the QBank, the EOC,
3. After that the CFA EOC, as for the examples/questions within the material, I do them as I go along and I repeat them at times, also answering the LOS, I also intend to do the questions in the CFA Investment series books published with Wiley. (how relevant are the questions in those books?)
4. Then I plan to do the Mock exam questions of years prior to 2014 for practice, also the Kaplan exams for prior years and then simulate exam conditions with the 2014 Mock papers & Kaplan papers, also do the 2015 mock exam offered by the CFA and use the Kaplan exams for the 2015.
5. I was thinking about also filling in the gaps between the 2013 and 2014 syllabus and use the 2013 exams as simulation practice (or will that be too much?) – it is only a matter of a few readings really
Now for a few questions regarding the ethics and the curriculum:-
1. The appendices in the Ethics sections have to be understood & memorised or just read for understanding? Because I could not find any questions related to them in the exams or am I wrong?. I do not mind learning this stuff personally I enjoy the ethics part.
2. Are the facts and figures supposed to be remembered? For example this happened to the market during the financial crisis or this was the volume of trade in a particular market. Again I did not see any questions related to facts & figures or am I wrong?
If I have missed out anything in my prep approach please do let me know, even if it the most obvious thing in the world.
PS: I am using a detailed planner to keep things on track for example pages per day, hours, revision needed, EOC/scores/timing, Other books questions/practice/scores/timing, etc
 
You have great enthusiasm, but I don’t agree with this plan for several reasons:
1. Starting to study for the June 2015 exam now really sets you up for burnout. I would wait.
2. Why are you moving from undergraduate finance books to the EOCs in the curriculum? The EOCs are based on the curriculum- you should prepare for these questions by reading the curriculum. The CFA curriculum will not necessarily follow some unrelated textbook- this is a very risky move.
3. Preparing for the 2015 exam by using 2014 materials is not advisable. Wait until the 2015 materials come out. Why take the risk?
For your other questions: You don’t need to memorize facts and figures about trade volume, etc. All relevant background information that you will need for specific questions will be provided. I’m not sure which appendices you’re referring to, so I can’t speak to that.
In general, my impression is that your plan is unfocused: If you want to prepare for the CFA exam, you should really focus on the CFA materials (and related third party study aids like Schweser).
 
1. Why start early? I am a slow learner and burn out? not really because I pace it properly, as in the daily routine is just challenging not too much not too little.
2. Again I learn slowly, get my basics right, also not to waste the Kaplan EOCs and CFA EOCs (want to use them as small tests, lack of familiarity during training prepares a person for the unknown generally, then repeat the EOCs when necessary), the idea is to understand the material, the basics of finance do not change, but I will limit other books to the extent that if I feel I have a good grasp over it then I move on to the CFA questions.
3.Checked the 2015 syllabus LOS by LOS, only a few changes, a reading here and a reading there, the Ethics will have a new 11th edition SOPH which basically adds to the 10th edition [have a copy of both 10th and 11th (draft)]so if one has studied the 10th not a problem just read the 11th and add the info to it, the derivates readings have been condensed, the FRS has two removed and variation in the place of em two, just not that different really, infact overall I think 4 readings have been removed.
I am referring to the appendix in the GIPS, the samples Appendix A & C, what is the point of those?
CFA material (past moack papers and current) and other aids like Kaplan (also past kaplan papers) will be used, the other books like schaums’ outlines, CFA Investment series and others are there to get the academic mindset, timing, problem solving
So that brings me to the two things that are still not clear:-
1.What about the CFA investment series workbooks published with Wiley … what are those for? and how relevant are they for the CFA?
2. Should I also use the 2013 exams as Exam simulation practice? Again it is only a matter of few readings so I do not mind studying those few readings from the 2013 syllabus (just thinking out-loud: this is the tipping point of over indulgence for me really, considering I am a slow learner, but the advantage that I have is that I can forget stuff easily so even though if I learn the stuff from 2013 it won’t interfere with my learning for 2015.. but if it does interfere I will stop)…. so If I do 2013, 14, 15 practice exams I will have atleast 18 fresh exams to practice (only counting Kaplan overhere but will do the mocks too so I will have more exam practice) .. the reason for this practice over-kill is timing … a person can always imnprove upon their timing which in such stressful exams is a BIG problem for most
 
appreciate your feedback .. please do continue
 
Again, I disagree with this plan. If you are interested in reading the other books, you should treat that as a side project, but under no circumstances would I suggest that you rely on that as your main preparation.
For your other questions:
1. I didn’t use the Wiley books for my preparation, but I’m familiar with them from other contexts. The problem is that they are not level-specific. For example, the accounting book is organized by accounting topic rather than by CFA level. As a result, L2 and L1 material is presented together and you have no idea of knowing which material is relevant for L1. This is the opposite of what you want when you are trying to focus on the exam.
2. You can use 2013 exams, but I would use them selectively as an extra source of questions. For example, if you need extra practice with deferred tax liabilities, find some problems from 2013 and practice with those.
My advice to you is to stick to the 2015 CFAI curriculum and Schweser texts. You will have plenty of material there to keep you occupied. Reading unrelated textbooks and Wiley books will not help you with the CFA exam.
 
I agree with Minerva. Stick with CFAI curriculum and known study guides like Schweser. The CFA exam is the world according to the CFAI. Some may agree with other sources, some may not. Doesn’t matter. If your mission is to pass the CFA exams, stick to the CFAI material only so you don’t get confused.
Once you complete the exams then you can go back and compare to other books (if you really want to at that point).
I think it’s okay to start early but I would start off with the more conceptual stuff like Ethics and Economics. If I was starting today I would probably take my time going through the Schweser books. Doing practice questions and EOC along the way. Once finished I’d take a practice exam and then just focus on the sections that you were most down on. Take another practice exam and keep trying to lift the lower sections up each time. Keep in mind which sections are weighted the most on the exam too.
 
If you learn slowly (like me) you have to plan your review sessions. Other wise you get to the end and the first page seems like a completely new page.
Also the 2015 curriculum is available now. It’d advise you use that. After you pass, you can skim the other books for interesting things not covered in CFA.
 
Not reading those books, just using their questions as a warm up haven’t done academic style testing in quite some time so my timing/speed is a bit off, so once my answering speed is up then moving onto the Kaplan (schweser) questionsand CFA questions for practice or main preparation as you say
1. I have the Wiley books, I have seen the material and actually it is very easy to tell whether something is in level 1 or 2, easy to tell if the questins are part of level 1 or 2, (sure you have to think a bit but then again it just takes a second or 2 to know “nope not a level 1 question”) and the questions in them are very similar to the CFA EOC questions, so IF I do them I will just do the questions I know are relevant to the Level 1. I have almost finished studying the currciculum, only 1/3rd of Eco and half of Quant are left, so now I am starting the learning by rote method (for stuff that needs to be memorised, actually writting it down 3 times, saying it outloud twice or thrice), and at the same time doing the example questions. Will start with the other books for answering speed, then move on to the EOC, also dont want to have finished all the EOCs too early before the exam. When I get a bit tired I just look at the Kaplan videos. So Considering the time I have and the amount of the curriculum I am done with, I dont think I will lose my focus and burn out is not possible since I give myself plenty of rest. And in anycase if it turns out to be the case that I feel like I am losing my focus I will switch strictly to the CFA material.
So basically the practice is:-
Step 1: Other book questions just for getting in the habbit of answering questions, timing, etc a warm up
Step 2: Kaplan (schweser) EOC - small timed tests
Step 3 CFA EOC - small timed tests
Step 4: Redo all errors and guesses, Kaplan (schweser) Qbank
Step 5: Selected questions from past exams Schewser and CFA
Step 6: Exam simulation, then revise - redo exammistakes, difficult or guesses/wrong questions from step 2, 3, 4 & 5
Step 7: Repeat step 6 (if at any stage i feel i am doing too much i will stick with the CFA curriculum)
2. I understand your argument but the difference is of only 53 LOS that have been removed the rest is the same with a few additions in 2014. And since I am done with 2014 a reading here or there wont matter, but again if I feel I am over doing it, I will leave it and just use the 2013 questions for selective question practice.
as for the 2015 (I have checked it myself LOS for LOS, and you can see the Apptuto changes and Irfanullah changes) the changes are of 3 readings added and 6 removed, more like condensing from 6 to 3, and the SOPH 11th edition for ethics, obviously I will get the 2015 curriculum because examples in the Quant section have been changed and anyother nitty gritty changes if done, however, having observed the CFA curriculum changes page by page since 2011 (i do not do something until I know as much as I can possibly know about it), I do not really expect the material to change radically for 2015
So the only irrelevant stuff are the extra readings of 2014 I have already done and the 2013 extra 50 LOS I MIGHT do
thanks again Minerva, your feedback has helped with the thought process a LOT
 
@octavian
not slow in your manner… a simple slow: I read and my brain processes slowly, not always though just when the curriculum goes on and on and on and on, when it could have quite clearly been structured more effectively….. just like my comments …. i go on and on and on and on, whereas i could have very easily said something in a few steps or lines…. however, i forget stuff easily in the sense that if I study something and then 3months down the road if I do not even touch the specific idea even though I read other relevant material, the details of the specific idea escape me until I revise … for your memory issue it could just be a strong case of the recency effect
what you have might be due to not being able to give the material relevance or meaning, understand it intuitively as Sal Khan says .. all people with excellent memory do so
alternatively what you can do is .. write the important points in the margins as you read, highlight/underline the important points as well, once you are done with a section of a particular reading go back and look at your hand written points or the underlined/highlighted parts, then proceed to the next section of the reading, this process will be slow but it will make revision easier, alternatively you can download the kaplan videos on piratebay and use them for revision
just my two cents
 
@Guy
I am almost done with studying the curriculum .. just need to practice questions and memorising stuff.. but thanks anyway
 
the CFA 2015 curriculum is out since august 1st , I got my copies a few days back
 
Interesting plan but doesn’t seem very efficient. I just passed Level 1 after being out of school for 7 years and only studying the Schweser notes and I’m no genius by any count. Not to say that this is going to work for everyone but there’s no reason to make it more difficult than it has to be. My recommendation is to use the Schweser material referring to CFAI when something is unclear and do a tonne of practice exams…i did 10+ in the 3 weeks leading up to the exam which I thought made the difference.
 
Interesting plan but doesn’t seem very efficient. I just passed Level 1 after being out of school for 7 years and only studying the Schweser notes and I’m no genius by any count. Not to say that this is going to work for everyone but there’s no reason to make it more difficult than it has to be. My recommendation is to use the Schweser material referring to CFAI when something is unclear and do a tonne of practice exams…i did 10+ in the 3 weeks leading up to the exam which I thought made the difference.
 
@MarkyD
i agree it is not efficient because I am slow, like really slow when it comes to academics, the reason for using the CFAI curriculum is that when I compared the Level 2 curriculum to the Schweser notes for Level 2 the detail is just not there in the Schweser notes, so I thought just study the level 1 material and get used to the detail, and it isnt particularly difficult to read through… but some individuals do clear all 3 levels with just the Schweser material
I would have detail rather than miss out on anything, I also find summarised material to be irritating I am just a bit too curious at times, in my opnion if anyone has to condense material it is always a good idea to have information in point form or steps, tables along with side notes explaning the logic behind the material or a simple Who, what, why, when, how,where type of arrangement of the information, so in that sense Schweser doesn’t help me much, except for their videos
another reason for taking time is that it is not a sprint for me, in my case it just doesn’t make a big difference whether I finish the CFA quick or slow, so I would rather prepare step by step which actually makes it an easier/assured process in the long run with a healthy workload, in anycase if I feel my prep is slow I will just crank up the speed a notch or two
and in anycase I am finished with most of the curriculum just need to practice, memorise, simulate the exams; you are spot on about the exam practice it is the one thing that make a big big difference but I am curious about the exam practice how did you get 10+ exams because Schweser has 6, CFA free mock is 1, did you buy more of the CFA mocks or the Elan exams?
thanks for your input MarkyD
 
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