Yawn ....

Lack of sleep, stressed and the ever presence worry that I won't finish reviewing all materials for the CFA exam. I long to the day that I can just simply chill out enjoying the sun ... well when the sun does come out in London.

- The cat is a permanent resident of Venice.

Porter's five forces and Marrakech's souk (err ... some kind of food) shops

A bit of downtime musing from the CFA study. Porter's Five Forces analysis:

1. Buyers bargaining power. High, the same stuff everywhere.

2. Suppliers bargaining power. Unknown, I wouldn't have a clue about the suppliers details for these guys.

3. The threat of substitutes. Medium ... I guess. Not entirely sure if substitutes are available or if buyers are even going to be bothered to look for substitutes.

4. Threat for new entry to the competition. Fairly low I'd imagine. The souk is probably 100% occupied so setting up a new stall is the biggest barrier of entry to compete.

5. Intensity of competitive rivalry. Again fairly low. These guys are probably know each other and have some kind of cartel going on :)



So should you enter the (err again not sure what is that thing they are selling there, it's obvious that I can't cook ... let me call them stuff) stuff industry in Marrakech's souk?


- Photo taken from the my travel back in 2006.

CFA Lv 2

So I've signed my life away for the coming months for CFA Lv 2 exam in June 2009. I fully expect a repeat of this year's hell studying for CFA. Apparently according to those who have done it, Level 2 is the most difficult level. Sigh ... let's just hope this is all going to worth it ... somehow :)

CFA

OK ... by some miracle and an obvious marking error, I passed CFA level 1 exam. I've been trying to ignore it as I was certain that I failed. I've been trying to be a bit blase about it too.

But truthfully, I was there on the website, 10 minutes before the result was released and refresh my web-browser exactly at 2pm London time. OK yeah I admit it I was a bit anxious to find out about the result.

It took me at least 5 minutes to login. It timed out initially but it went through the second go. For a few seconds I can't believe that I see the word "PASS" there. Phew .... I guess all that hard work didn't go to the drain after all.

The incredulous feeling soon turned to joy and a few seconds later turned ugly, because you know what this means? I have to do Level 2 now! Arghhh ....

Well I can't really complain now, I'm rather happy that I passed. Yeah it's not all >70 like some people did, but I pass alright. I even got >70 in Economics of all subject. That is the one subject I was absolutely certain I will fail.

Turned out that I failed in Portfolio Managed (<50) and so so in Alternative Investment (50-70). The rest are >70.

Good times :)

CFA ... bah ...

I bombed out CFA exam level 1 earlier this morning. Result won't be out for a while yet, but I doubt that I will see "Pass" on the that day. If, and I would say this is a minuscule probability, somehow I miraculously pass this exam there will be huge party with beer flowing on my tap. That's a promise.

I did reasonably well on the first part of the exam. Using my own intuition on exam result (I'm quite good at this, usually spot on during high school/uni days), I should get around 75% ish. It was the second exam that got it. I reckon I would be extremely lucky to score 60%.

What went wrong? And how did I manage to throw the past 4 months of studying down the drain?

On the long train ride to Baker St. from the Excel centre I thought about this. Basically it can be narrowed down to 2 simple factors:

1. I underestimated the amount of materials.
2. I severely overestimated my motivation and ability to study.

All those unanswered questions on exam are covered in the assigned readings, there's not a lot of derivation required but you do need to understand the materials. I simply could not recall them. I lost count how many times I said "Darn ... I wished I had reviewed this last night".

So where to now? It would seem to be a waste to throw away that study. Would I do it again this December? I don't know yet. I'm not sure if I have the motivation to do this again, although if I do, I would know how to study this time.

Suggestions to those studying for CFA Lv 1:

Study more ... earlier.

It is not a hard exam, but the amount of materials to be read can kill a person ... literally (those assigned reading books weigh a ton).

A consolation, straight after the exam I went to the new Wembley Stadium to see Foo Fighters. Those guys are amazing life and on recording studio. It was the best show I've seen so far. Nothing like it, great show, great atmosphere and great crowd. 86,000 people all came to see just 1 band. I had a bit of reservation earlier on a stadium concert, but they did such a great job. It's also great to see a band on their prime on a huge concert.

What a way to end this first half of 2008 :)

Friday night post (or more about the CFA)

Doh' Friday night at home posting to my blog. I'm rather sick this past few days and unfortunately it's school day tomorrow. I have mentioned in my earlier post that I'm taking the 7City course to have someone kick me on my behind to keep me in track with my study.

I have to say I'm quite impressed (so far) with the quality of the tutors and the service that they give to the clients. I chose to do the weekend programs, it will be 10 Saturdays spread over roughly 4 months. Yep it's rather drastic, taking a lot of my Saturdays this first half of the year, but I really won't be able to do it in the evening or worse, taking 10 days off during the week. Not after the many days off I've taken in the past few months (and more in the coming months).

And to make things worse, since I'm an IT contractor I have to do this on my own time and dosh. So taking 10 days off work is terribly expensive for me. No other options there for me but for the Saturday classes.

So anyway 10 Saturdays written off for me (and probably including Friday nights) except I'm going to miss 1 session to go Snowboarding in mid-March. However 7City is great in this way. The online class room is great (although can be improved ... technically). They record the lectures and put the archive online for students who miss them.

Plus they give extra questions for each study sessions, 6 workshop sessions, 2 days revision and mock exam. Plus the evening sessions are stream live over the Internet for those who are doing self-study. Pretty darn good value in my opinion.

Of course none of this matter if you don't actually study.