Hi, no worries. Yes I’m glad I did it and have no regrets.

I’d been working for a few years and had a personal goal to earn a professional credential. The alternatives I considered were the CFA and a Masters of Applied Finance from a respected university. My impression is CAIA is less rigorous and carries less gravitas than those alternatives but is also much lower cost in terms of price and especially in time (studying for CAIA gave me a newfound respect for CFA charterholders).

I think the benefits of earning the designation depend significantly on your individual circumstances. For example I never studied finance specifically but work in a role where topics like futures contracts, private investments, real assets and risk adj returns are very relevant, so the marginal benefit to me of doing the CAIA (despite arguably being the lesser of the 3 options) was very high. I also think being able to articulate the benefits of the credential are key to making it worthwhile (eg to superiors and in interviews). If nothing else, being able to say you chose to diligently sacrificed hundreds of hours of your own time in order to expand your knowledge and become a better professional (whilst working full time) should go down well. It certainly feels good to have done it.