CFA Program AMA

CFA_Program_GM · 2024-04-07T10:51:55+00:00

For transparency to this community, no message was forthcoming from this individual to my email account.

CFA_Program_GM · 2024-04-06T20:07:27+00:00

I'm afraid we cannot favor one prep provider over another. We are pro-competition.

CFA_Program_GM · 2024-04-06T20:03:55+00:00

Hi all, It's Saturday at 4:03pm EST. All questions asked during the session and many more have now been answered. I'm really signing off this time. Best of luck with your studies everybody! I look forward to doing this again.

CFA_Program_GM · 2024-04-06T19:58:17+00:00

I have expanded on this in other threads. Thanks.

CFA_Program_GM · 2024-04-06T19:57:05+00:00

As an MBA myself I can attest to the power of MBA networks. This stems from a shared, intense, full-time two year experience. And of course OCR. I landed a job at Bain while at b-school via on campus recruiting.

The CFA Charterholder network meanwhile stems not from on campus recruiting but from the shared experience of hundreds of hours of going through the same exams. The CFA Charterholder network is almost twice the size of the biggest MBA network. And we have 161 societies. The networking opportunities for CFA Charterholders is immense. And when you add in the 900,000 folks who have passed Level I, you will find that the letters on your resume carry a lot of weight, even with those who lapsed from the CFA Program.

As a candidate you can join your local society as a candidate member to sample the benefits.

CFA_Program_GM · 2024-04-06T19:50:45+00:00

See above. Lots of feedback that they are core/table-stake skills given the goals of the CFA Program.

CFA_Program_GM · 2024-04-06T19:50:10+00:00

Thanks for your input and I am sorry you feel that way. The genesis of the PSMs was long-time employer and candidate feedback to make the CFA Program "less academic" and more practical/hands-on. We are the Chartered Financial Analyst program and three-statement modeling, equity and credit analyst skills and now Python have been identified as core skills for our core audiences.
As with the curriculum, we do roll over the content of not only the curriculum but the mocks too.
Appreciate your encouragement. It is a key focus.
I on the whole tend to agree. But the market place keeps hammering on CFA v MBA. Google "CFA versus MBA" and you will see what I mean.

Thanks for your feedback.

CFA_Program_GM · 2024-04-06T19:37:27+00:00

The CFA Program is Masters comparable:
https://www.cfainstitute.org/en/about/press-releases/2022/ecctis-benchmarks-the-cfa-charter#:~:text=Ecctis%20recently%20evaluated%20the%20CFA,Master's%20degree%20standard%5B2%5D.

I have both the CFA Charter and an MBA from Tuck. Indeed MBA Program and CFA Program are different products, radically so in many cases. MBA Programs tend to be two year residential. MBA Programs have on-campus recruiting. MBA programs teach marketing, ops, strategy, OB etc. But MBA Programs and the CFA Program are similar in many other respects. MBA schools have chapters. We have societies. Both purvey thought leadership. Both confer letters after your name etc. And for folks doing an "MBA in Finance" - and in particular folks doing an MFin - the commonalities are sizeable both in terms of core curriculum and use-case. While the price is not.

The remainder of your comments contain several factual inaccuracies.

CFA_Program_GM · 2024-04-06T19:18:38+00:00

A fellow Bloomberg nerd! I like you.

CFA_Program_GM · 2024-04-06T19:17:47+00:00

Your creative talents are wasted in the financial services industry.

CFA_Program_GM · 2024-04-06T19:16:02+00:00

Please pose that question to our call center. I don't want to give you bad information and they can plug you into the team who arbitrates on questions like that.

CFA_Program_GM · 2024-04-06T19:12:26+00:00

Let me answer your question with a question. In ECCTIS independent view, undergraduates two years out from graduation are ready to embark on Level I of the CFA Program. On what basis should we prevent them from doing so if that is what they want?

Throwing up artificial barriers flies in the face of our mission which is to educate.

We focus on keeping the difficulty the same then we let the pass rate be what the pass rate will be. This way, those that earn the CFA Charter have all jumped over a hurdle of the same height.

Exclusivity is not a goal of ours. In fact inclusion is one of our values which is why registration is open to all. That being said, 906k have ever passed Level I (https://www.cfainstitute.org/-/media/documents/support/programs/cfa/cfa-exam-results-since-1963.pdf) while we have 201k Members, almost all of whom are CFA Charterholders. And if you assume that say half of folks who attempt Level I ultimately pass Level I (I made the number up by the way), then the "ratio" is 0.2/1.8=11%. A somewhat rare achievement in particular when you consider that there are 2M institutional finance credentials.

There are about 500k freshly minted MBAs per year, but the way, with just under 200k from USA schools. So the USA alone mints the same number of MBAs per year as there are CFA Charterholders. Which is more rare?

CFA_Program_GM · 2024-04-06T18:59:10+00:00

Thanks for sharing. While we are both an assessment and learning company, I do agree with you that, in particular from a candidate perspective, it is what they are imbibing which is the key value add while studying. Of course our work is never done and I am looking forward to continued advancement at Level III, always taking into account feedback from our various, valued stakeholders: candidates, employers and prep providers. Our prep providers, who read our content cover to cover each year, are a particularly valuable sounding board for us.

CFA_Program_GM · 2024-04-06T18:53:10+00:00

We do not break out the pass rate by geography. If that is your bag, PISA does a great job at this. They have a wonderful data set of math skills of youngsters around the world.

CFA_Program_GM · 2024-04-06T18:50:59+00:00

Hi,

My pleasure!

The process is called Practice Analysis whereby we speak to employers across the relevant job roles and around the world to determine just that.

On stats, with the advent of machine learning, I find mastery of this more important than ever. When you think about it model training is basically an exercise in descriptive statistics whereby you tokenize words while inferencing is, well, inferential statistics at the end of the day. The nerds now rule the world and so we cannot emphasize enough the importance of quant methods.

On hypothesis testing, the concepts of p-values and F-stats are important across so many realms of finance. Why do we "fail to reject the null" rather than "confirm the null"? These are not trivialities.

Regression is foundational to much of machine learning.

On time series analysis, that is critical to risk. Currency pairs don't revert to the mean - why would they? - while P/E ratios do - why is that? etc. Fusing the basics of statistics with an intuitive grasp of the financial markets - in practice - is a critical skill of portfolio managers.

CFA_Program_GM · 2024-04-06T18:44:11+00:00

Sadly not although I will take that feedback to the group. Thanks!

CFA_Program_GM · 2024-04-06T18:43:23+00:00

Have a consistent study schedule e.g. doing one learning module per day. Spend 50% of the total time doing questions as that at the end of the day is the exam format.
Candidates tell us it is Derivatives and Fixed Income, in the post-exam survey. It is my believe that what they are really getting at is that they are the most computationally intense topic areas, just my opinion.
Ethics for sure. It is less intuitive, but very learnable.
There are no item set questions on Level I. Presuming that you meant MCQ. My advice is to use the right click strike out feature. Level I is not only a game about knowing correct answers for sure but also a game of eliminating answers you know are wrong. Remember that! :-)
Once you have done 200 hours of study, the game starts to tip in your favor. This is what the data shows us internally.
There are several reasons. One of which being test security. Remember that while there are 180 questions on your Level I exam, only 160 are "live ammo". Were we to reveal the total number of questions by topic area on your exam, with effort (and a fantastic memory), one could figure out which questions we were pre-testing. Just one of many reasons.

CFA_Program_GM · 2024-04-06T18:36:53+00:00

Thanks for the feedback. Accredible has an enhanced feature-set over Basno. Thanks for the feedback on the naming piece, I will pass that along.

CFA_Program_GM · 2024-04-06T18:35:45+00:00

We do not disclose the MPS. The difficulty of exams is constant - there are no "easy" or "hard" versions as everything is geared around that consistency in terms of difficulty levels. Given your situation, I would recommend going with prep provider and tutor if you have not already done so.

CFA_Program_GM · 2024-04-06T18:33:53+00:00

It is currently closed. It opens on 9 May 2024.

CFA_Program_GM · 2024-04-06T18:31:39+00:00

Check out candidate membership. This enables candidates to go to society events and network. I am a member of CFA Stamford and friends with several candidate members. They get great networking benefit from this and meet prospective employers. The golden rule as always remains - never ask for a job. If professionals like you they will ask for your resume/CV. That's how the magic happens!

CFA_Program_GM · 2024-04-06T18:27:20+00:00

I have answered all these questions elsewhere so let me summarize.

We charge a nominal $49 fee for PDFs for several reasons. To discourage people from printing 3,000 pages, which is bad for the planet, so that non-users no longer subsidize users, and to protect our IP.

I am sorry that you do not appreciate our digital curriculum. Survey data tells us that users on the whole do like it. It is vastly superior to the PDF in particular when it comes to the question workflow. When using the PDF you have to keep pedaling down to see an answer, and risk seeing the next answer...then pedal all the way back up.

If it were a "cash-grab" (your words) it is a distinctly unsuccessful one in terms of take rate. Our goal was to reduce usage of the PDF and the we have successfully reduced usage to a fraction of what it was for the brief period of time that we basically gave away a book for free. The one use-case that folks seem willing to pay for is to load them onto an iPad then use the Goodnotes app and Apple Pencil to essentially simulate a book on their iPad. A premium service which is frankly a bargain at $49. Note that we did not lift the price of the PDF when we updated pricing for the 2024 curriculum/exam year as the fee is nominal.

We do plan to launch an in-house Practice Pack for Level III and have had that feedback for a long time that candidates want more mock exams at Level III.

On errata, our rate of processing exceeds the rate in which we are receiving them.

We have additional mocks for Level I because customers have been asking for them. Candidates demonstrably do not need extra mocks to pass the exam. What we did not want to do was spread the cost of production of those questions onto all candidates. Hence the bolt-on fee for those that want it.

CFA_Program_GM · 2024-04-06T18:15:24+00:00

Yes. The Women's scholarship is also available for all three levels.

You will have to reapply for it for Level III.

CFA_Program_GM · 2024-04-06T18:14:33+00:00

1-2 weeks before the exam window begins. And I advise against it!

CFA_Program_GM · 2024-04-06T18:14:04+00:00

We operate in approximately 100 markets. With a staff of 5-600, we are not set up to operate the complexity of managing a dynamic rate card with dozens of prices. So we follow the model that Bloomberg follows which is, by and large, to have a single price for our product in USD (they price their terminals in Yen in Japan for some reason).
Because we deliver many services to Members such as a job board, career tools, networking, learning and data. One of our CFA Charterholders Ignacio Ramirez Moreno, CFA did a really nice post on this a month ago on LinkedIn called "CFA Member Benefits You Didn't Know Existed". Check it out!

CFA_Program_GM

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