SIE , Series 79 and Series 63 Advice
Hey fellas,
I just wrapped up getting my SIE, S79 and S63 within 120 days of starting my full time role and I wanted to provide some advice to anyone taking it. I know this topic has been spoken about a lot, but these forums really helped me prepare and I felt like I should do the same. I used Knopman Marks.
High level: Everyone loves to talk about how easy the test were, or how little they studied - DO NOT LISTEN TO THEM. By no means are any of these test super difficult (80%+ first try passing rate), but they aren't easy either. You need to have a dedicate study plan and routine to pass these test. There are numerous ways to study, find what works for you. I personally recommend taking notes on the videos, and skimming through these notes a few times a week + QBank + summary + additional notes (email sent from Knopman). MAKE SURE YOU READ THE ANSWER CHOICES FOR ALL QUESTIONS, RIGHT OR WRONG.
SIE:
- Difficulty: Medium - Really high level topics, but an abundance of information
- Study time: 50 hours - 80 hours (depends on your ability to retain information, experience/knowledge, etc.)
- Study tips: Focus on understanding all the topics at a high level, definitions and associating words (i.e; old investor > conservative investments > liquid + stable > munis, money market, etc.). Don't get caught up in the quantitative questions and work on eliminating answer choices. This is an ENTRY LEVEL TEST!!
- How I prepared: Knopmans videos + workbook > class summary > QBank (wrote answers/notes next to respective section in summary). Was hitting low 80s before test and mid 80s on assessments/benchmark
- Difficulty: Medium/Hard - More in-depth than the SIE with more difficult quantitative questions (not that much harder though)
- Study time: 60 hours - 120 hours
- Study tips: Same tips as the SIE, but make sure you focus on word associations - this will help you eliminate answer choices. Write out all the major topics: IPO, M&A, Tender, Bankruptcy, Documents, Placements, Regulations, Suitability, Advisor Roles, and Quantitative. When completing the QBank you will get ultra-specific answers, it is important you read these, but also recognize which ones are stupidly complicated. Financial Statements provided on test are super small (10-15 lines), and are pretty straight forward.
- How I prepared: Knopmans videos + workbook > class summary > QBank (wrote answers/notes next to respective section in summary > note sheet). Was hitting low 80s before test and on assessments/benchmark
Series 63:
- Difficulty: Easy/Medium - Gets pretty specific and often times is underplayed as super easy
- Study time: 25 hours - 50 hours
- Study tips: This test has a small amount of material. It is important you read and understand all of the material provided, and are able to rationalize your answer choices. A lot of the answer choices were extremely similar and had one word differences. Know the big 5 (BD, Agent, IA, IAR, Admin) and State v Fed regulations/jurisdiction
- How I prepared: Knopmans videos + workbook > class summary > Kaplan QBank (wrote answers/notes next to respective section in summary). Was hitting mid 80s before test and low 90 on benchmark - however, I felt like the Kaplan questions were not as strong as Knopman's questions on other test. 90% on Kaplan = 80-85% on Knopman
Timeline Breakdown:
- 6 weeks for SIE
- 8 weeks for S63
- 2.5 weeks for S63
Study Tips:
- Create a schedule (1 chapter every 2 days, etc.)
- I found taking 30Q after each chapter to be the most effective way to learn
- Prioritize the heavily tested chapters
- Most of your time should be allocated towards doing the QBank
- Make sure you are understanding what you are reading, not just reading
This is a helpful post, but it also makes the tests seem really daunting, which they aren't. Your 16.5 week timeline, while comprehensive, is total overkill. I just came in as an off-cycle hire and passed the same 3 exams in under a month. I watched all of the Knopman videos on 2x speed (2 days), took detailed notes on every video, and did 800-1000 practice questions for each exam (2-3 practice exams per day for 5 days).
I'm not trying to discount your post OP, I'm just thinking that if I came across it when studying I would be pretty freaked out that I'm underprepared and I don't want future Analysts who see this post to think that way.
Well listen here try hard fucko. Everyone is different and you must be a better studier/retainer of information than OP. So how about you just calm the fuck down. You think of that?
troll post?
Did u read the textbook for any of the exams or is it not worth touching? Out if curiosity what were u scoring on the qbanks/benchmarks before u took the exams
Never opened the textbooks. On the first few practice exams I would get a 50-60% and that would build up to a 75-85% by the end of the week. On the final benchmark exam you should be getting 80%+.
Really good info here.
What I would recommend to almost all that know they have their job lined up and are booze-cruising their way through their last few months in college is this: go ahead and knock the SIE out of the way.
Is it hard information? No. Is it voluminous? Oh yeah. There’s just a lot of information and a lot of the questions are very date/rule/formula specific.
You can take the SIE without being sponsored by the firm. Get the Knopman Marks prep, charge it to Pop’s Amex in the name of education.
The series 63 requires a weekend of study.
You knock the SIE out early you can focus on the 79, which does require a good bit more prep.
There are also Content Outlines for every test on the Finra site. Just print one off and go through and make sure you know every topic and you easily pass.
What? Why would anyone study SIE before starting? Completely disagree
Totally agree. I would recommend getting it out of the way your first summer that everyone kinda just pisses away. Looks good on your resume and if you know you want to work in financial services get an exam that you're probably gonna have to do out of the way. It looks good to recruiters.
I used Knopman and would recommend. I basically relied on the online videos and the practice tests. I rarely opened the text books unless there was a concept I was having trouble understanding.
I would watch the videos all the way through (with the slides printed out and take some notes) and then take the practice tests (took these over and over until I got almost 90%). I actually was pretty nervous on the tests and felt like I was under prepared but passed all three exams on my first try.
I kind of wish they provided you the score, just to see if I was close to failing.
Anyone have any free/used pdfs to study with for the SIE/63/79? Would really appreciate it
dude wtf lmfao how on earth can anyone actually take more than 3 weeks for these tests? Complete overkill. I used Knopman and did this:
SIE: 60 hours
79: 60 hours
63: 25 hours
The 63 is a meme and can be knocked out in a weekend if you just grind it. I hate posts like this because it gives people hella anxiety for absolutely no reason. Just do the videos on 2x speed and do the 1000 practice questions for each test.
For reference, I passed all on my first try and here was my average score with Knopman the day before taking each test:
SIE: 85% to 90%
79: 80%
63: 70% to 75%
Knopman babies you through it so hard that it's almost impossible to fail unless you just don't pay attention. I'm really going hard in this reply because I read so many posts like OP's fearmongering the exams and it just wasn't that kind of vibe.
Is it just me or is that an obscene amount of hours? I'm supposed to take SIE before my start date, you're saying that'll take ~65 hours. So I need to set aside over 2 hours a day for a full month, while I'm juggling school work, extra-curriculars, and partying in my last time as a college student?
that sounds pretty obscene to me
Plz fix
If you were a finance major in college and completed an IB internship the previous summer, would it be possible or likely to be able to pass the SIE without studying? or are there too many esoteric dates, laws, concepts, etc. that this would be a terrible idea.
You will fail 100% of the time. The test has almost nothing to do with IB and maybe 30% would of been learned at school
Passed all three and just did the knopman videos and associated video workbook. Then I would take practice tests until I hit 500 questions. All there is to it. Also don’t underestimate the 63 everyone said it was easy so I didn’t study as much and then ended up cramming two nights before the exam bc I kept getting 50s on the practice tests lol
This all depends on the work schedule too. If you start the job and it’s long it’ll be harder and if you’re lucky like some of my buddies the firm actually lets you study and prep before really even starting any work and might even place you in a classroom with an instructor to spoon feed you haha
For the Series 79, I scored a 54% after reading the book and need to take it soon (1-2.5ish weeks). Should I be concerned and any advice to maximize my prep?
I wouldn't worry, but you absolutely want to put in some solid prep work in over the next 1.5-2 weeks. The Series 79 isn't impossible or anything, but it isn't a walk in the park either. The "at the margin" questions that you need to answer correctly to snag a passing score are based on concepts that you just won't know unless you memorize them- specifics regarding registration-exempt transactions, named rules/laws, dates that you have to file form xyz- you get the picture.
My firm gave us KM (not sure how relevant this is if you have a different course)- assuming you also have KM, I would do the following;
1. Read and memorize all of the key concepts. If you know all of the key concepts well, you will pass.
2. Do practice exams/questions. For the SIE, the KM practice exams were way harder than my actual test. For the Series 79, I found the difficulty between the mock exams and the actual Series 79 to be the same. Knopman will tell you that you will likely pass even if you average a high 60, but imo, you aren't ready to pass the exam without majorly sweating in the testing center until you start consistently getting high 70s. At least one full-length exam per day + review of questions and topics you got wrong in the textbook afterwards seems like an adequate plan if you have more than a week to prep.
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