troymo

Coming from someone who works in audit - if you want to do audit, particularly auditing financial services companies, the CFA will absolutely help set you apart. People in audit do get that the CFA is a demanding and very difficult program to get through. However, there's not really a direct application of what you learn in the CFA program to auditing - moreso gives the impression of "this person is smart and can dedicate themselves to something".

Plus, if you want to be successful in audit, you'll definitely need to take the CPA exam (required to make a manager position at most public accounting firms, also some firms require it to be a senior). So make sure you consider that when you make the decision as well. From my experience the CFA is significantly more time consuming than the CPA but that doesn't mean the CPA is easy.

The other thing about audit - the more experience you get in audit, the more "typecast" you can get as an accountant. Your options will open up significantly if you want to get into finance at a large company, especially if you go Big 4 / what I call "second tier international" (this being Grant Thornton, McGladrey, BDO). You'll have options including financial reporting, financial analysis, capital budgeting, internal audit, etc. even after just 2-3 years spent in public. But if you want to be a trader/analyst audit really isn't the route to take to get there.

firat

As a former auditor all I can say is that passing CFA all level will not get you into the audit field.
Auditing firm will ask if you have taken all the required accounting and auditing courses,
to carry out the audit.

KungFuPanda

oops my bad, thanks for the correction, i always get confused on the too, haha.

dvilayphet

CPA is for auditing, CMA is for cost accounting and budgeting.

ninja1024

I think you and I are facing the same dilemma,
overqualified for many entry level jobs but underqualified for many jobs that require experience.

Argh...

RoastBeef

the short answer is there is no relevancy whatsoever. you are better of doing a CMA to get into auditing.

I totally understand your concerns though. I have a bachelor and a masters in finance, plus i passed cfa level 1, I no experience and had no breakthrough in anything related, not even an unpaid trainig. Its been like this for years, so i have finally settled into an unrelated job to pay rent and im still looking for a break.

the only way out of your dilemma is to network with people. i personaly really suck at that so ill have to improve on it i guess. good luck