Topic Weights in CFA Level II

@vincentt….
the 2013 mock in on their website. I just downloaded it yesterday so maybe it was put up recently.

No problem @shantala!

@vincentt item sets definitely cross topics. There will be a ‘main theme’, but you’ll definitely see questions that use concepts from other topics. I’d be interested to see which source that states a per-reading basis for each item set.

Hi @christine thanks for the % weighting table, are you saying that there’s a possibility that each item set could have questions from different topic (e.g. derivatives vs fixed income, etc) ?

I remember reading it somewhere that it’s usually quite down to per reading basis for each item set?

@christine I couldn’t recall where I read that but it could have been my mistake.

thanks for the info!

@diya I’m surprised. Usually out of 6 questions, 1 or 2 questions would incorporate some aspects from other topics, especially if they naturally overlap.

@diya good to know, thanks for the heads up. Btw, where did you get the 2012 CFAI mock? As far as I’m aware the 2013 mock isn’t out yet?

@diya for the dec 2012 I think they did send out an email informing about the mock, didn’t get any this year. Thanks will download that shortly! 😀

@christine and @vincentt I just worked through the 2012 mock exam (CFAI issued) and I found that the mini-case was topic focused.

And on the 2013 exam it gives a breakdown of question by topic.

@diya did you mean, each item set is per topic basis?

@vincentt yes, that is what I meant.

Hi @shantala – welcome to the forum!

Another point of reference is the exam results breakdown, i.e. the results email you get when CFA Institute announces the results. That break down is as follows:

In terms of thinking about item sets, it’s less straightforward than that. As the item sets allow more in-depth questions compared to Level 1, you’re right in suspecting that item sets mix several topics into one question, combining concepts learned across the curriculum. It’s not a simple task of saying ‘topic X will have Y question sets’ for some topics, although for others (Ethics, for example) you normally can rely on for a set number of item sets to appear in the exam.

Hope that helps. You can also find more analysis information about Level 2 topics here: http://www.300hours.com/1/post/2012/08/analyzing-passfail-differences-in-level-ii-2012.html