CFA CFA Level 2 L2 – when to start?

L2 – when to start?

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    • Avatar of edg94edg94
      Participant
        • CFA Level 1
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        Passed L1 (yay!) recently but have heard lots of scary things about Level 2, so wondering if I should be starting earlier. I started in early March for L1 June exam, should I start in January for L2? Or even earlier? 

        Veterans, your advice is much needed!

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        From my first year, when I was a member of my local CFA Society, I attended a meeting at which study strategies and statistics were given and there was a Q&A. The survey they presented demonstrated that the most successful candidates began study in January, and those who began in September, as I had, were less likely to pass. I think the biggest reason might be burnout.

        Nonetheless, Level I is not Level II, and Level II is a beast.
        My own idea to give myself two weeks per Study Session, followed by 4 weeks revision and mock exam time, for Level III, would have me start study next Monday!

        I think this is too soon. It’s summer, here in the Northern Hemisphere, and I want to enjoy my freedom to go out, see friends and family, read books again, watch films in the cinema, and just soak up some sunshine (as I so often couldn’t when I was preparing for the exam).

        If you can consistently and with discipline study at least 2 hours per weekday night and at least 4 hours per weekend day, maybe you’ll be fine with a January start. Have a read through the L2 syllabus, even if you haven’t signed up, you can find the entire LOS listed on the CFA Institute website. There you can make a semi-educated guess as to how long you think you’ll need to understand all of that.
        I started in October one year, and failed, then in October again the next year, and passed. Strategy is important!

      • Avatar of policedogpolicedog
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          • Undecided
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          I would recommend starting in January as well, with a clear plan on how to use your allocated time. Burnout is a real issue – I started in Sept for one of my attempts and hit a ‘hump’ where I was demotivated, not studying, and not doing much useful.

        • Avatar of JaminioSilvaJaminioSilva
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            • CFA Charterholder
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            Good
            answers here but the key points are you must have a strategy and yes, burn out
            is real. Thing with L2 is it is deep, very deep. It’s quite hard to explain how
            deep it is until you are quite a way in and start doing the second pass at EoC
            questions and that can panic a lot of people when you do your first past paper
            and get 40%!

             

            There are
            a huge number of calculations to do and unlike L1, you can’t just learn the
            formula and move on. You need to understand how that formula works in the
            context of what they’re going to ask. If there are 5 steps to a problem, they
            may ask about step 2 and 4 or 1 and 3 etc. so you’ve got to know every part of
            how it works. That takes time.

             

            There
            isn’t a fixed best time to start as everyone is different, but you need to a)
            give yourself enough time to digest the concepts. b) give yourself enough time
            to PRACTICE each section THOROUGHLY and c) do lots of vignette style questions
            to feel comfortable about how they are going to ask these questions (this is underrated,
            you need to do this).

             

            The best
            advice I read after failing L2 the first time (passing the retake) was to 1)
            give yourself 500 hours to read and practice everything in the syllabus (I didn’t
            do that but still scraped through, I would have been much more comfortable had I
            followed that advice) 2) go through the syllabus and highlight everywhere it
            says calculate, then write each formula out in words and a worked example, then
            do 5 example questions on that formula (doesn’t have to be complex just putting
            different numbers into the worked example). 3) do every EoC questions multiple
            times especially the vignette questions as you need practice time on Vignette
            and EoC chapter questions are part of the curriculum!

             

            However long
            it takes you personally to do those things, that is when you start. 300hours
            have a good write up on the reality of hours require per week vs when you start
            (link at bottom). Personally, I feel that starting really early and just drip-feeding
            bits in can be useful but not really getting into the “lock yourself away
            all night” phase until after January. 6 months is a long time and burning
            out in the last month is a real problem. If you were going to start early, then
            I’d suggest starting with the strategy stuff like reading how vignettes work
            from the EoC questions even if you don’t know the answer – hint, the questions
            are chronological down the page but sometimes a big passage will have 1 question
            then a single sentence can have 3*. Also, working through the all the calculate
            LoS’ without the pressure of a study schedule was a big help for me as they can
            take quite a bit of time to do properly (especially derivatives) and
            understanding the mechanics of the formula really helped when I then sat down
            to do the reading and had some context for the concept.

             

            https://www.300hours.com/how-long-to-study-for-cfa/#.W6DEeflReM8

             

            Edit – *This is how the vignette questions are laid out in EoC, End of section test and past papers; I couldn’t possibly comment on what they were actually like in the exam.

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