Exam Feedback May 2016 Part 1 Exam Feedback
- Thread starter Nicole Seaman
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frmcandidate2016
New Member
That's what I thought. Maybe it was that way other years. But that wasn't my feeling this May. The material is good, but not adequate to pass this last exam. My opinion, of course.
Diep Anh Ngo
New Member
Did anyone finish 3 questions abt Expected loss and Unexpected loss? I did not have enough time to calculate all three questions 
devdutt.21
New Member
Any idea how many students attempt the exam... most of the seats in my centre were empty.. same thing was confirmed by my friends.. they too found many seats empty.. Paper was very tough and lengthy.. fingers crossed
Expected the exam to be more difficult to be honest. After 3 hours, I arrived at question 100 with having 10 - 15 questions left open. I then concentrated on the ones I knew how to solve (e.g Binomial Tree one), chose a random answer for the ones I did not have a clue (for example sample autocorrelation...) and then checked my calculations for the other problems a second time.
I don't understand why people hang around with questions for 10 - 15 minutes. In my opinion, all questions are designed such that you should be able to perform the necessary calculations within 2.4minutes - but only if you know how to solve it from the beginning on. If you do not know it, well then you were not prepared for such a question and should move on immediately.
Prepared with reading Schweser Notes, did Bionic Turtle Questions and Schweser Notes / GARP Practice Exams. I also prepared a formula notebook with ALL the formulas.
I don't understand why people hang around with questions for 10 - 15 minutes. In my opinion, all questions are designed such that you should be able to perform the necessary calculations within 2.4minutes - but only if you know how to solve it from the beginning on. If you do not know it, well then you were not prepared for such a question and should move on immediately.
Prepared with reading Schweser Notes, did Bionic Turtle Questions and Schweser Notes / GARP Practice Exams. I also prepared a formula notebook with ALL the formulas.
To state that the GARP books are not adequate to pass the exam is absurd - people really need to reassess their level of commitment to this designation if they are claiming the exam is unfair or too difficult. If you want to quit because it is too difficult, then quit. The rest of us will continue working hard to achieve the worthy goal of earning the designation.
I think it is a question of efficiency. I read through all the GARP books first, mainly because I am interested in the subjects. However when it comes to actual exam preparation (hammering things into your brain), I would never recommend to work with GARP books - the risk is quite high that you loose yourself in detailed explanations without recognising the key concepts. It is the same as for the CFA: The original curriculum is extremely well written, however for the exam you need to know the key concepts and not a detailed derivation of some formula (for example).
devdutt.21
New Member
That was a nasty statement. Students are only sharing their feedback which was the objective of this thread. If you dont like it maybe you shouldnt read it.
If students are paying for the exam.. their commitment should not really be doubted as they are putting money where their mouth is unlike others..
was the exposure amount a percentage of?Did anyone finish 3 questions abt Expected loss and Unexpected loss? I did not have enough time to calculate all three questions
Siqueue
Member
I may be projecting here but I don't think people are "claiming the exam is unfair", rather that it is difficult to prepare for as the sample papers are not particularly representative of the live exam.
Also, for me, having bugger all scratch paper was really difficult, and pointlessly so. I didn't realize that I'd have to scribble in the corner of an A4 sheet when I prepared for the exam: it just didn't occur to me that GARP would treat paper like gold dust.
Also, for me, having bugger all scratch paper was really difficult, and pointlessly so. I didn't realize that I'd have to scribble in the corner of an A4 sheet when I prepared for the exam: it just didn't occur to me that GARP would treat paper like gold dust.
So you've done these question (not all of them as you said). I was unable to find the exposure amount. How did you calculate it? EA = outstanding + drawback * credit line. But I didn't understand the way drawback was expressed. It was not like schweser exam. It was not a percentage...Did anyone finish 3 questions abt Expected loss and Unexpected loss? I did not have enough time to calculate all three questions
Hi @devdutt.21 ,
I don't see anything wrong with what @brian.field said. You have to realize that part 1 and part 2 are totally different beasts. We both took part 2 and I can tell you that if you don't at least skim through the GARP books before hitting the BT notes and videos it's going to be a very long test day. The sooner you get into the habit of reading the GARP material the better your chances for passing part 2 are. Irrespective of whether you chose BT or Schweser, GARP readings should be a must for everyone. I'll admit though, for part 1 I didn't read all the GARP books because I already had my level 1 and 2 of the CFA so that helped; but I wish I had. Also, like everyone else, @brian.field is only sharing his opinion.
frmcandidate2016
New Member
...sharing his opinion in which he states that other opinions are absurd. Also, to answer both of you I just want to clarify that my opinion is not about Part 2 or about FRM as a whole, it is just about THIS year's Part 1 exam. Did any of you actually take the exam for Part 1 this May? I'll keep trying, of course, I just want to know what is the best material to study since what I did didn't result as I expected.
Hi @frmcandidate2016 ,
All that aside, I took Part 1 in November 2015 and was able to pass fortunately. I wasn't able to gather your experience in Finance in this chain but I'll assume intermediate to be conservative in which case I would recommend the GARP material combined with BT (videos and problems). What I did for part 2 is I went through the GARP material and then watched the BT videos and did the BT problems. If I got stuck on a concept then I just wrote it down and didn't spend too much time because David's videos clarified almost all of them. Part 2 results aren't out yet so the credibility of this method is still up in the air. As for part 1, my previous post mentions what I did.
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So.....let me try to justify my statement, even though I regret some aspects of the delivery (my apologies for that.) We live in the real world. Some folks think that the exam should be easy. It is not easy. Some people complain about it being unfair - it is not unfair. Some people claim that the readings are not sufficient to pass the exam. I find this to be absurd. Every single question on the exam was presented in the material somewhere (I believe). Even more incredible to me is that some people believe BT Materials to be insufficient. I also find this to be abjectly false.
The exam is not easy - I don't think anyone would pursue it if it was so easy to achieve. It is also unfortunate to see people looking for the easiest way to pass the exam. It seems more people are interested in finding the shortcut than learning the material. The fact of the matter is simple - if you know the material, you will pass. If you do not know the material, you might pass.
We are human and we have our deficiencies. I contend that those that complain about the exam being unfair or too hard need to examine themselves for the deficiency. In the mean time, I will try to look inward a bit more to manage my obvious deficiencies - which include an occasional lack of empathy. I will try to better manage that!
As always, I want you to pass - I want all of us to pass. Perhaps just as important, though, is the fact that I want to encourage scholarship, hard work and sincere effort.
All the best.
Brian
The exam is not easy - I don't think anyone would pursue it if it was so easy to achieve. It is also unfortunate to see people looking for the easiest way to pass the exam. It seems more people are interested in finding the shortcut than learning the material. The fact of the matter is simple - if you know the material, you will pass. If you do not know the material, you might pass.
We are human and we have our deficiencies. I contend that those that complain about the exam being unfair or too hard need to examine themselves for the deficiency. In the mean time, I will try to look inward a bit more to manage my obvious deficiencies - which include an occasional lack of empathy. I will try to better manage that!
As always, I want you to pass - I want all of us to pass. Perhaps just as important, though, is the fact that I want to encourage scholarship, hard work and sincere effort.
All the best.
Brian
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Dr. Jayanthi Sankaran
Well-Known Member
Well put Brian - totally agree
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berrymucho
Member
These EL questions threw me off as well. I was familiar with the "Schweser nomenclature" EA = Outstanding + Drawdown * (Commitment - Outstanding). If my memory serves me well the questions indicated the drawdown and the "expected exposure, as a percentage of the credit line". I think the questions were toward the end of the paper, I was rushing to finish, so I couldn't analyze too much at all. I just went ahead assuming that expected exposure [%] * credit line "looks like" an EA and somehow obtained one of the 4 answers (!). Which is probably incorrect, so I'm counting these questions in my tally of "wrongs".
More generally, and I might be biased, I felt there was a lot of currency exchange/swap questions.
I have done the same .. could be wrong .. but it was one of the answers
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