CFA Complete Waste of Time; Here's Why... university, experience, teachers, nothing, because

manchester88

This thread is targeted towards two types of profiles:
Younger candidates probably still in university or fresh out of it within the past 12-18 months.
Older candidates with some type of professional experience outside of finance looking to get into finance
You may think you are some sort of special gift because of what parents and/or teachers have been drilling into your mind. Let me assure you that there is nothing special about you and for every special thing you think you may have there will be another guy who will be ten steps ahead of you and thus much better.
Is this so bad?
ABSOLUTELY NOT.
However, you want to be in finance and let me assure you that a proper entry-level finance job is damn near unattainable. Even assistant portfolio manager positions and analyst positions are impossible to interview because the competition is unreal.
Please go on your local career websites and show me how many jobs there are for CMA/CGA/CA?
Then show me what the F*** is there for CFA’s?
…but, but, but
Younger and/or gullible idiots always point out “hey, but CFA is required for portfolio mgmt.”
Really, genius? What makes you think you can even get an interview for an Assistant PM, let alone a full PM?
Again, show me the CFA jobs…at this point you will be thinking of networking and all other types of nonsense to get you in, but at the end of the day you’ll be beat down OVER AND OVER AND OVER AND OVER AGAIN! Networking will kill you, because the population of egomaniacs & psychopaths working in finance will judge you and spit on you.                                            
The CMA is the best route to go for general analyst roles on the corporate side. CA will be a waste of time due to the articleship headaches. CGA is ok, too.
Younger kids in college/university; DON’T WASTE YOUR BRAIN AND ENERGY ON THE CFA. You will end up old and bitter like myself.
I can show you examples of Portfolio Managers right now who do not even have the CFA yet are the most respected managers on Bay Street (Toronto). I also know of younger Associate/Assistant PM’s who simply hold some generic undergrad degree. What does this illustrate? If you are from the right background (i.e. WASP) most likely they will take you. On the other hand, if you are a kid who has worked his ass of throughout university at two jobs and come from a working-class background, good luck to you….Finance is loaded with arrogant, pretentious, psychopath yuppie types. Run away while you can.
Any idiotic responses to this thread should be replied with a comparison of how many CGA/CMA/CA jobs vs. CFA jobs you can come up with…I rest my case.

Kapie

This is the worst post ever.
I thought you are a very lucky guy to get 4 to 5 interviews in 1 year without even passing CFA level 1. Whether they recruit you or not, it has nothing to do with CFA.
Well, if your post title states “CFA complete waste of time”, then why the fuck are you still doing it?
If I were you, I would stop moaning and get the ass moving into why you failed your interviews?

lunarfollies

Andy in NYC got you bleach. But again what is a CMA? I never heard ot this.

Muddahudda

It’s one thing to say that CFA won’t help you break into a finance job.  Or that it’s not all that important in investment banking.  Or all that important in private equity.  Or even overkill in some forms of wealth management, where many employers would prefer something like a CFP.  Or a heavily quantitative job, where the CFA just isn’t mathematical enough.  All of those are reasonable points of view.
It’s another thing to say “It’s a complete waste of time,” which implies that there is no value at all in learning anything in the curriculum.  For any job.  Under any condition.  Ever.  This is what your subject line says and what the drivel in your first post communicates to anyone with the patience to go through it.
Your subject line where you lost credibility with me, and with most of the posters on the forum.  
Perhaps the CFA was completely useless to you, although you haven’t even gotten through Level 1 yet if I understood your post, so I’m not sure what you were expecting it to do, exactly.  And what you are pursuing may not be the sort of thing that the CFA is useful for.  In any case, it was never intended to be an entry-level credential, which seems to be what you are claiming it isn’t (welcome to the club of people who agree with you on that point).
The CFA is designed to help people who want to manage investment portfolios for individuals and institutions, and work with the techniques of valuation, portfolio construction, attribution, and some risk managment, along with a set of ethical and professional standards.  If those things aren’t in your targeted job description now or at some point in the future, then don’t do it.  (Though some of the principles are useful for personal portfolios, too).
But your complete ignorance about what are the sorts of things the CFA can help with, and your assumption that young people need to make sure they aren’t interested in it no matter who they are or what they want to do is just uninformed and batty.
And if you are having trouble in interviews, I would suggest trying to do some work on your personality.  Do some anger management.  Even here on this anonymous forum, pretty much everyone here can tell that you have a chip on your shoulder the size of Greenland + Spitzbergen.  If anyone in an interview also perceived that, they would want to run from you as fast as they can, no matter how qualified you are or which letters you have after your name.  People just ask you a question and you’re already assuming that they have the worst of intentions with the answer.
You need to chill out a bit, dude.  The job market is tough for everyone these days, and no one needs more anger in their life, or their coworkers.

laurab

All I can add to this is CMA is a Certified and/or Chartered Management Accountant, yet another designation, this one Canadian, though I think other Commonwealth countries have the equivalent or is it Japan that has CMAs too. Anyway I would say I see accounting designations requested a lot more than the CFA, but Toronto is the financial capital of Canada. If you want a safe job, accounting is probably the way to go, even after Enron went tits up they still need forensic accountants.  ;-)
Big 4 accountant types have told me the CA is the one to do, but I know this one younger dude who is an acronym collector, he was concurrently doing CA and CFA, now he’s doing some business evaluater certification. He agrees CFA is the hardest.
I think networking and attitude play a role, as does health. In Vancouver and Toronto, two of the most multi-cultural cities in the world, this seems strange. In Vancouver it is advantageous to be a Chinese speaker.

ba736

Angry Canadian?  Must mean the Molson Ice is all gone

mkytz15

LOL.  Sour grapes from someone who did not pass.
Also someone who doesn’t have  a Bloomberg where every job posting mentions CFA as a prerequisite.
Go drink some bleach.

Roflnadal

Bleach, are you a CFA chartholder ?? I think you just met the wrong persons, do not generalize the entire finance industry based on 5 encounters with arrogant poeple. There are dumb poeple everywhere.

dandman

i really like this bleach guy ova here

hassan

I actually find this post pretty amusing.
Anyway, there are investment management, IB or jobs like that for entry level candidates. The problem is they are reserved for a narrow segment of job candidates. Most candidates or either unsuitable or not lucky enough to get one of these jobs. In these cases, accounting, or other professions like that can be a prudent (although unglamorous) choice. For many people, taking CFA exams while waiting for their dream job to come around can be a form of denial.