What’s goes well with CFA® Prep?

Studied Economics during undergrad and didn’t get enough finance/accounting under my belt apart from what I learnt in the finance/investing club, and have been using online resources to learn as much as I can. My goal is to get to the investing, asset management side of the business.

I decided to enroll in the CFA® to really get the technical material under my belt. I was wondering if there was anything else that would go well with the CFA®? I was thinking Wall Street prep, researching companies, reading philosophy and value classics (security analysis etc)

Thoughts?

 
Most Helpful

popper_stoic

Okay thanks, is there anything you would personally study alongside the level 1 material?

Just focus on the CFA exam. Be sure to do well in FRA in L1 as L2 builds on it. Once you get to L2, you probably won’t have much free time.

"If you always put limits on everything you do, physical or anything else, it will spread into your work and into your life. There are no limits. There are only plateaus, and you must not stay there, you must go beyond them." - Bruce Lee
 

I usually start with top down analysis: idea generation -> comps -> DCF. Have a solid portfolio already, so it’s important for me to see how a new security fits in. I use Python and Excel for modelling. I also find it important to track the performance weekly and make allocational adjustments 1-2 times per month as needed. Efficiency comes with practice I would say, as you keep changing the process and then you’ll find ways to improve.

 

The CFA material is good enough by itself to pass the exam. But as I noted, Level I is really a summary of 4 years of undergrad.....hard to say that cramming 4 years of undergrad textbooks is a practical strategy. However, if I could make one textbook suggestion, it would be to read a solid fixed income textbook....at least halfway through. It will serve you well from Level I to III.

Also, many people get good valuation experience in their IB and ER jobs.  Few of us have brushed up on convexity and duration which are both important topics throughout the test.

 

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