Preparing from the CFA Textbooks

Last Updated on Saturday, 16 January 2010 11:25 Monday, 04 January 2010 10:10

Written by crazycfa

2 Comments

So you have enrolled for the CFA Program. The books have arrived. But as soon as you open the box and see the box, you want to put it back. Ok ok, you turn a few pages and admire the beautiful cover and think that one would be really great to read the books, but its not gonna be me. And soon the books are packed in the box, taped and hidden in one such corner of your home where you might never be able to see it again.

This is the story of most of the candidates appearing for the CFA exams,especially level 1.

Well, if you might actually read a little more of those CFA books you will realize that the books have been written by the best brains in the concerned area and very much relevant to the management industry. You are an accountant,MBA or have a good finance background then you might very well hide the books. But even in that case it is not advisable to do so.

Well if you have a strong finance background then, reading the whole set of books word to word would be unfruitful. In that case you might pick up some prep provider material and go through it.If you find any trouble,then refer to the CFA books, and this what most of the successful people in the CFA exams with a  finance background do.

But if you are someone who belongs to a different domain like engineering,medicine etc... then simply being dependent on the prep provider material wouldn't do good. And most of the failures are included in this list.

I know you have a job that sucks 12 hours of your time, and you have enrolled for the CFA program and giving the CFA exams are something you are doing a great honor to yourself...then you should take a medal after the exams you know and not knowledge. You must just plan out well and give the exams and the preparations your best shot.

Anyways coming tot he main topic. Preparing from the CFA books, and whether it is possible.

Well if you can devote substantial amount of your hours for the CFA exams, then reading the books have no other better alternative. Things are very well explained and taught in a way that you would feel that it is a story. And you are simply reading it like a novel. It is there that you would actually enjoy reading stuff like a novel. But then you must have an exam like approach. So side by side, it would really be helpful to make notes side by side of all the important points and formula. Remember by doing so, you are actually preparing your own material which might prove better than any prep provider material.

And this is a very important exercise too as when the revision time comes you are self dependent and able to revise better. I don't about the prep provider material, but if you are through with the CFA books, you need not go for any other extra knowledge. And remember, post the CFA exams, the knowledge that you would have got, would be immensely useful for the exams.

Alternatively, what people have tried is to balance the CFA material and the prep provider material. Like one person read the books completely and then used the prep provider material for revision. This exercise is good enough but then you must be well assured about the quality of the prep provider material and whether they cover every requisite part of the course or no. e.g. Stalla is quite exhaustive in this case. They stick to the CFA textbooks and they could very well be called a summary of them. So your hard work for creating the notes can be saved quite well. More so some irrelevant readings which would take up a lot of time from the CFA books and Stalla can be used in that case.

The conclusion is: Don't ignore the CFA books and try a way out to balance it well with some prep provider or learn to make good notes. The knowledge that you would gain from the CFA textbooks is invincible.

Have a look at yourself, go for a demo classes at different prep providers and make a calulated decision.

Best of Luck.!!