How I Passed CFA Level III On My First Attempt

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How I Passed CFA Level III On My First Attempt
               By Alexander Del Olmo Irizar If you ask a CFA charterholder which CFA exam level they found the toughest, they are likely to answer either Level II or Level III . CFA Level III is especially...
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kelvinyun · Answer

I strongly agree with the author. I took the June 2015 Level III.

Morning session - out of 11 questions, i left 3 questions TOTALLY BLANK due to HORRIBLE TIME MANAGEMENT. When I was doing the questions, I thought it was "TOO EASY" and i WROTE TOO MUCH. The room was cold, and i WENT TOILET THREE TIMES, that probably wasted 15 minutes of exam time. When the result came out, there were questions which i scored BELOW 50% despite thinking they were too easy. I suspect I had gotten only 50% for the morning session.

Afternoon session. It's ok. Can finish in time, and had an additional 30 minutes to check my answers. Gotten above 70% for all topics. If I were to evaluate myself, probably actual scores were between 80% - 90%, thus puling up the grades from morning session.

I came from an engineering background, never had any financial education when i embarked upon Level 1. Thank God i was able to complete all 3 levels in one shot, because I know I surely wont retake the exam if i failed any paper.

Remember, you want to pass the exam. You must have a strategy.

My strategy is simple and the same for all 3 levels:
- (a) BREEZE THROUGH CFA CURRICULUM. Read it like a story book. Roughly understand what CFA wants us to know. This may take one month.
- (b) Then, read through KAPLAN notes CAREFULLY. It is time to UNDERSTAND what you read. This takes 2 months.
- (c) WRITE DOWN everything that's important into a notebook. I wrote down every important point that KAPLAN Secret Sauce (its a summary) does not have, into the Secret Sauce.
- (d) do QUESTIONS... as much as you can.

Level 1 - 300 hours.
Level 2 - 150 hours.
Level 3 - 200 hours.

The reason I don't emphasize on CFA Curriculum is because TOO MUCH STUFF TO STUDY. Unless all of us have mental powers like einstein, you cannot memorize it.

If you can just memorize the notes in KAPLAN Secret Sauce, its good enough. The KSS is only a small booklet with lots of short notes and formulas. Can basically read the whole KSS in 2 hours the day before the exam.