Level 2 Candidate

It's official – I am a Level 2 candidate (again). I paid the fee to enroll and received electronic confirmation that I am enrolled for the exam. One of the ethics rules makes it clear that you are not a candidate until you pay the money. You then remain a candidate until the day the results are released. Anyway, I had to register I couldn't wait much longer. I started studying a few weeks ago, but I have hit a wall. There are no easy study session left where they haven't changed the material from last year. Study session 10 (capital markets) looked promising, but they changed one of the readings. Same for statement analysis. I would be more than willing to do a hard study session but I can't, my son won't let me. I lost my job last fall (why I didn't register for the exam months ago). My wife works 13 hours a day on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Right now, on alternating weeks my in laws watch my 15 month old son for 8 hours on those days. On those weeks I have plenty of time which allow me to do some real studying. The other weeks, I am stuck with him all day long for 3 days a week. If you have ever babysat a 15 month old you know that you can't take your eyes off of them for 5 minutes. I have to strap him into the stroller to use the restroom. I am literally unable to study before 8pm this week on M, W, and F. That means I am limited to light material. However, there is no more light material that hasn't changed at least a little from last year.


I have finished corporate finance which is study sessions 8 and 9. Those are my favorite areas of learning usually and I don't know why I didn't get above 70 on the last exam. I did tighten up on economic income and profit (not like accounting income and profit). I did very well on the practice questions. This most recent week was quants – study session 3. The first two readings were single and multiple linear regression. I feel confident on those overall. I didn't study as much as I planned and am not as tight as I'd like, but I feel strong about it. The third reading is time series analysis and that could be tough for me if they test it in June (I'm certain they will ask at least 3 questions minimum). The first half on the reading is simple enough, but when they start asking me to test for errors and correct them, my eyes start to glaze over. This chapter more than any other in the level 2 curriculum has all of those weird statistics and symbols. If you remember high school trigonometry with all the weird greek letters, that is the last half of time series analysis. I am going to have to make some time this spring to learn this stuff. For now, I am moving on to study session 10. I should be able to work most of it by the end of the weekend. It will be even easier now that football season is over.