2024 CFA Level I Exam: CFA Discussion Topic: Study plan for level 1 this year and level 2 next year

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Topic: Study plan for level 1 this year and level 2 next year

Author	Topic: Study plan for level 1 this year and level 2 next year
beibei @2016-09-10 08:38:15	I plan to do level 2 in June 2017, providing I pass level 1 in Dec... How do you find it going right into studying for level 2? Is it something you would advise against?
wondefful @2016-09-11 03:53:46	It will be a full year of non-stop studying and I was really struggling towards the end, but I think it's well worth it. The problem with waiting is that by the time you take L2 in the following year, 1 1/2 years will have passed and you will have forgotten most of what you learned in L1. And the CFA does assume that you know the L1 stuff when you go into L2. So if you take L1 in Dec, definitely worth going for L2 6 month later in June. I would however recommend starting to study in January - this means that you risk having "wasted" a month of studying in case you then find out that you have failed L1, but the alternative is too risky in my eyes. Unless you have a strong FSA and equity background, you will need the full 5 months of studying for L2! There is a ton of material to go through and it is considerably more challenging than L1. The way I did it, is that I ordered the L2 AnalystNotes Pro package right after taking L1 in Dec. I then took a few weeks off betweeen the Dec exam and New Year and started hitting the books in Jan. Once I got the confirmation that I had passed L1, I immediately signed up for L2 and got the books about 2 weeks later. Once I had the CFA material I started focussing more on that rather than on AnalystNotes (for L2 AnalystNotes is not as good as it was for L1 and it's key to look at the CFA material too). But as I said above, I was very close to being totally burned out at the end. I highly recommend booking a holiday soon after the exam :-)

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Topic: Study plan for level 1 this year and level 2 next year

beibei
@2016-09-10 08:38:15

I plan to do level 2 in June 2017, providing I pass level 1 in Dec... How do you find it going right into studying for level 2? Is it something you would advise against?

wondefful
@2016-09-11 03:53:46

It will be a full year of non-stop studying and I was really struggling towards the end, but I think it's well worth it.

The problem with waiting is that by the time you take L2 in the following year, 1 1/2 years will have passed and you will have forgotten most of what you learned in L1. And the CFA does assume that you know the L1 stuff when you go into L2. So if you take L1 in Dec, definitely worth going for L2 6 month later in June. I would however recommend starting to study in January - this means that you risk having "wasted" a month of studying in case you then find out that you have failed L1, but the alternative is too risky in my eyes. Unless you have a strong FSA and equity background, you will need the full 5 months of studying for L2! There is a ton of material to go through and it is considerably more challenging than L1.

The way I did it, is that I ordered the L2 AnalystNotes Pro package right after taking L1 in Dec. I then took a few weeks off betweeen the Dec exam and New Year and started hitting the books in Jan. Once I got the confirmation that I had passed L1, I immediately signed up for L2 and got the books about 2 weeks later. Once I had the CFA material I started focussing more on that rather than on AnalystNotes (for L2 AnalystNotes is not as good as it was for L1 and it's key to look at the CFA material too).

But as I said above, I was very close to being totally burned out at the end. I highly recommend booking a holiday soon after the exam :-)

CFA Discussion Topic: Study plan for level 1 this year and level 2 next year

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I am happy to say that I passed! Your study notes certainly helped prepare me for what was the most difficult exam I had ever taken.

CFA Discussion Topic: Study plan for level 1 this year and level 2 next year

Andrea Schildbach