application of this degree FRM

[hemali]

Hi David

I read your replies on which course to take FRM or PRm and how are they different and what are there career placements in markets.which made my thought process crystal clear, on the course selection front.

I am a MBA fiance with 5 years of work experience and have choose n to do FRM as i wanted a career boost and wanted to pursue careers in M&A ans derivatives and Strategic alliance consultancy.

I have registered for this MAY 2010 FRM exams and as started preparing for the course i found that the syllabus is highly jumbled up and many topics are interdependent on one another.

when i started reading the course i find it difficult to relate each topics,and further i fail to understand the exam pattern also as in what exactly are the examiners expecting out of us and which reading each topics what should be my approach towards understanding the concepts,should i learn t he formulas,and their applications or it suffices to understand there application and real life usage.

Further i am here at ahmedabad where i am not getting proper source of solutions to questions given at the end of each topics ,further i also would like to have an idea on the way should speed up the process of reading and after completion of each topics how-do i access whether the topic is fully understood to the level they expect me to be ready in exams.

I was also looking for some help as to what percentage of time to be allocated to Quants and which topics are really useful in real life application.

Basically the holistic approach to study the syllabus ina fashion which would not only help me to clear my exams but more importantly this would help to-solve real life risk-management scenario at the organization i am working n.


IN anticipation


Thanks
Hemali

 

[David Harper CFA FRM]

Hi Hemali,

I don't think I have answers to all your questions but it occurs to me that some of your observations are simply endemic to the FRM. Specifically, you write "i found that the syllabus is highly jumbled up and many topics are interdependent on one another....when i started reading the course i find it difficult to relate each topics and further i fail to understand the exam pattern." And some of this, it seems to me, is unavoidable due to the evoluation of the FRM and, importantly, that the L1+L2 format is brand new. The interdepencies and (in some cases) redundancies are absolutely true.

Re: "I was also looking for some help as to what percentage of time to be allocated to Quants"
I do think the SEQUENCE of the FRM (i.e., 1 Foundation, 2 Quant ...) is somewhat natural and I would spend a signficant amount of time in quant simply because it is necessary but not sufficient to have threshold quant mastery in order to solve many of the questions.

David