Confidence Level Compared to L2

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cleverCFA

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How are you guys feeling at this stage compared to how you did at L2?
I don’t want to jinx myself but I have to admit to feeling a bit too relaxed and confident compared to L2 this time last year. L2 seemed like a beast that was a real fight to conquer, like the Conan wheel of pain kinda difficult.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e43RPVFINPs
L3 material seems so much more about “getting the gist” of the concepts and then working around that, rather than memorising thousands of formulas and working around those. For example, I just re-read the section on swaps. It’s a cake walk compared to all the calcs we had to memorize and perform at L2.
How are you guys feeling? Should I be worried that I’m not more worried?
 
For me it’s completely the other way:
At Level 2 i finished in mid April with EOCs, being able to solve most of them. I then started practice exams and consistently scored above 70% from the beginning on. I walked into the exam with a kind of “pretty unlikely to fail” feeling.
At Level 3 i am now at the same stage: finishing EOCs and starting mocks next weekend. I put in about same number of hours. But i can only solve some of the questions, especially the open ones annoy me. I don’t think my score in my first AM-mock will be above 50%. Don’t know how this changes up to the exam day, but as it looks now, it will be much narrower for me whether to pass or not.
 
I’m with you clever - I was significantly more stressed out at this time last year. And to be honest, I’m a little nervous about that. I’m beginning to wonder if my feeling of comfort is really just apathy at this point. I’m totall over the CFA program and need to be done for good. Despite my concern, I can’t bring myself to pour anymore time/effort into L3.
From day 1 motivation has been a struggle but I just keep grinding out the study hours. I think I need a particularly bad practice test score to light a fire under my ass. Maybe I’ll tank one…
 
Agreed, Im in the over confident boat right now. I think Ive already put more time into level 3 than I did level 2. Im probably around 150 hours or so at this point with 2 months to go still. I read over one of the mock exams and it didnt look too difficult. The material just seems so soft.
 
It’s a bit of a rollercoaster for me. I start to feel really confident dominating short answer questions and then one pops up that is really specific and makes me realize I’ve still got a long way to go.
 
I wouldn’t say I’m over-confident, I would just say that my level of caring about this thing is near an all-time low. I finished the Schweser books a couple weeks back and the plan was to then finish the CFAI EOCs in the next month. Instead, what happened is everytime I sit down to do a chapter’s I end up just looking at it for ten minutes and then stopping, saying “I’ll do it tommorow”. At this point, I’m going to need to feel like time is running out to actually get in gear.
 
I’m in the same boat. I started earlier for Level 3, put in more consistent hours, and finished my first pass earlier than Level 1 and 2. First practice test this weekend. Historically, my first practice test has always been a swift kick in the balls. I’ll have a much better idea of where I’m at on Saturday.
I’m having a hard time believing Level 3 is more difficult than Level 2. I felt so overwhelmed with material in Level 2 and really didn’t like my chances of passing. There were also several topics I struggled with in Level 2 (Econ and Derivatives primarily) but I just haven’t had any topics in Level 3 that feel super difficult to grasp.
I have a feeling this all comes crashing down Saturday…
 
L3 is clearly a different format to L2……here is the thing, all L3 candidates have earnt their place in the exam hall. Many candidates do not seem to get beyond L1, for various reasons.
Due to the grading method we are all competing and CFAi likes to keep the pass grade “competitive”.
I get the impression the margins between pass and fail bands are fairly narrow in L3 compared to the other 2 levels?
 
perdition wrote:
L3 is clearly a different format to L2……here is the thing, all L3 candidates have earnt their place in the exam hall. Many candidates do not seem to get beyond L1, for various reasons.
Due to the grading method we are all competing and CFAi likes to keep the pass grade “competitive”.
I get the impression the margins between pass and fail bands are fairly narrow in L3 compared to the other 2 levels?
Click to expand...
Level 2 had very narrow bands, but level 1 was wider
 
IsThereAny wrote:
It’s a bit of a rollercoaster for me. I start to feel really confident dominating short answer questions and then one pops up that is really specific and makes me realize I’ve still got a long way to go.
Click to expand...
I’m the EXACT same way. These constructed responses could have you feeling great where you spot a nice score on a big 30 minute question, or lousy if you don’t know that same giant topic
 
I was confident the last two years I took this exam and failed. I’m not confident anymore. It’s absolutely imperative to do as many questions and morning section questions as you can. Level III can lull you. I was doing fantastic on practice exams last year and thought I killed the exam… I saw a band 9.
Don’t get over-confident. This is a different beast.
 
AM is going to kill you. Don’t kid yourselves. Read carefully, write fast. You would be lucky to finish with minutes to spare.
Then, relax and put AM out of your mind when taking the PM exam. You are going to own PM. No worries.
 
I’m feeling better, though I owe that to having put more time in by now than I did at L2. I had to bust my a** to study what needed to be studied last year since I didn’t really buckle down until right about now.
I’m going to go to the gym here in a bit, then come home and study for an hour or so. Just gotta keep at it.
 
I’m definitely feeling less confident than I was this time last year. I’m still on my first pass of the material and I feel like I reached saturation point about mid way through swaps. everything since then has been a struggle. I’m not looking forward to GIPS and Ethics when I feel like I’ve forgotten everything else and need to revise.
1st mock this weekend and I can’t see it going very well.
I do feel like I’ll be able to pick up more points between now and exam day relative to the same period for level 2 though.
 
write fast
do all questions where u know the material inside out. not confident on some questions…read next point…
leave spaces in between answers if have the time to go back and edit answers or add on
do not aim for the perfect answer and write all the additional info. answer to the point. IIRC was only on my 3rd question an hour into the exam, and i have another 8 to go. not easy to rush thru all in that short a time. was very lucky with a pass
 
i feel like cfa l2 test material was much more straightforward. besides, the calculation-based questions really helped boost my confidence partly bc of muscle memory too. L3 on the other hand is pretty tolling on the brain i think.
 
It’s hard to say for me..
I’m on the CFAI EOCs right now and it seems that I either get nearly perfect scores on them or I get less than 50%..
 
this time last year, i felt panic (as i did the dec-june turnaround)
this time: i finally managed to finish first pass, and i realize i cant remember anything i read back in nov-jan (schweser book 1-3). i feel am so doomed
 
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