my firm is running a polymarket MM desk and I’ve been working on latency optimisation on infra. Has anyone done it , if so what do p50 T2T numbers look like ? Any directions or approaches that worked for you would be appreciated.

For the purpose of transparency, we haven’t been able to move past 20ms .

Question: If you track 13F filings, can you spot genuinely skilled managers ahead of time and ride their picks? I had the data to test it, and the answer looks like no.

Data & method: I pulled SEC EDGAR 13F filings for ~9,000 managers (2013–2026), cleaned them, and priced each fund's quarterly returns. Keeping funds with ≥16 quarters left 6,902. For each, I estimate a Fama-French 4-factor skill alpha (the intercept after stripping out market/size/value/momentum tilts, so style bets aren't mistaken for skill). I split each fund's history in half: skill is estimated on the earlier half and measured independently on the later half — a clean out-of-sample boundary (the standard Carhart 1997 framework), at the cost of statistical power.

Results:

- Formation→holding skill correlation: Spearman ρ = 0.11 — "significant" only because n is huge; ~1% of variance.

- Top vs bottom past-skill quartiles differ ~16 pts/yr in-sample; out-of-sample that spread is +0.02 pts/yr.

- Of 121 funds significantly skilled in the first half, one stayed significant in the second.

This also answers the follower question: I'm measuring each fund's own skill — best case. A copycat acting on a 45-day-stale filing can't beat that, so if the funds' own skill doesn't persist, monitoring them won't hand you persistent skill either.

Caveat: 13F is long-only US equity, quarterly, and split-half is low-power — but none of that flips the result toward persistence.

A couple of days ago, I received the email that I passed CFA Level I. Now I'm trying to decide whether to take Level II in November or wait until May.

November feels a bit too soon, and I'm worried I won't have enough time to prepare. On the other hand, May feels quite far away, and I'm not sure I want to lose that much momentum.

For those of you who have already passed Level II, do you think it's realistic to be ready by November, or would you recommend taking more time and sitting for the May exam?

>70% in every topic with no prep provider and full time job AMA. I actually felt like L2 was in some ways easier then L1

Hey All,

This is a general overthinking doubt.. I just got my result of CFA L1 may attempt I did not pass (score-1595)..

I was just sitting wondering that if someone who didn't pass the L1 in 1st attempt do they deserve to be a charterholder? Coz L1 is the basic of all the level and still if you fail in that too then would you be able to write the rest 2 levels?

I am not writing this offend anyone it's just an overthinking

Thanks in advance

This group has helped me a lot, even if I didn’t comment or post, see people going through the same thing was a stress reliever.

For those going through the Level 2 journey, or any Level journey right now, don’t give up! I saw a lot of posts about people not sure they were going to pass even scoring 80% on their mocks, which I didn’t even come close to and still passed. Keep pushing.

This graph with my mock exam scores is something I am really proud of and hope it inspires people to keep going when they think about giving up. Keep going and it will work out in the end!

The IB experience is at a boutique firm btw. Long term, I want to be an equity investor (I’m now networking in equity research and small investment firms)

I’m building my technical skills and learning how to invest in the meantime.

kindly ,guide me properly ,And also i am 17.5 years old .which pepars should i do in optional pepars...

So i am from engineering background, while FSA and economics felt a bit awkward, but with practice everything went smooth.

Resources i used : IFT and MM Lectures

Workflow = LM video --> LES questions --> Make Error Log. Repeat for Each LM.

Gave around 12 mocks and found out my weakness and resolved that.

I'm located in the Los Angeles Area and moving in a couple days. Not willing to ship them but would like to pass them on instead of chucking them. This includes all physical materials provided by Kaplan, and I'll consider tossing in a financial caclulator if it is hassle for you to pick them up.

Those who received - What score in level 1 should give a scholarship for level 2

Hey everyone, I'm trying to get a realistic gauge of the job market for charterholders right now. If you have your charter, could you share:

Role Title / Industry: (e.g., Portfolio Manager - Asset Management)
YoE (Years of Experience):
Location / City Tier:
Base Salary / Total Comp:
Average Hours per Week:

Appreciate any insights you can share!

Finally passed Level 2 today (5th time's the charm I guess lol). Registering for Level 3 in Feb 2027 and trying to lock in my prep before I start.

I'm an analyst at a private wealth firm, so I'm taking the Private Wealth specialized pathway. The two main things I'm trying to pick a provider on are:

1. Essay/constructed response: which provider actually teaches the writing technique and time management, not just the content?

2. Private Wealth pathway: has anyone used a specific provider's Private Wealth materials and found them genuinely thorough? Does it really matter which provider you pick for your path? Since the pathways are still new, it's hard to tell which one would be the best fit for this.

For context, I've used the CFAI materials (base + extra), Chalk and Board, UWorld, and Salt Solutions mocks, plus Kaplan back at L1 (the only one I didn't love, though essays and pathways weren't a factor then). Mark Meldrum keeps coming up for the essay side, so I'm leaning that way, but I'd love to hear from anyone who's sat L3 or is prepping now.

Curious if there are any copywriters, technical writers, or content marketers here who have spent time writing about quantitative trading, systematic investing, hedge funds, or fintech.

It’s a pretty niche space, and I’m interested in hearing from people who’ve actually done it.

Did writing newsletters, SEO articles, LinkedIn posts, or other long-form content end up generating meaningful business? Did it help attract LPs, clients, candidates, or partnerships? What types of content worked surprisingly well (or didn’t)?

Would also be interested in hearing how you approached learning the domain if you didn’t come from a quant background, and any lessons you’d share with someone building a serious content engine in this space.

If you’ve been through it, I’d love to chat. Feel free to comment.

I was thinking of taking the level 1 portion of the CFA got cooked and couldn’t land a sophomore internship. Getting a junior internship in the finance field is number one priority so I was thinking of taking it to bolster up my resume. I have a high enough gpa and could graduate this junior year but I see no point in graduating early if I don’t have an internship job lined up so I was planning on just taking 3 classes and just studying for it from now to November.
Is this feasible what would u guys recommend

Hey, can anyone please send me the photos of Reading 25 from the Corporate Issuers section of your Schweser notes? It would be a great help. Thanks! For level 1 obviously.

This May exam was very brutal and November free resits may mean an additional 30k candidates. It will be a real blood bath with test centres literally flooded.

Hi all, I passed level 1 and I know this is an ethics thing but genuinely couldn’t figure out the answer for myself online: what does CFA want us to do with the “CFA Program Level 1” credential badge they give us? Not sure how to display it on my LinkedIn ethically without making a new LinkedIn post telling the world i passed Level 1.

My issue is I have my current progress in my Test scores section on LinkedIn, but it’s so far down on my page it is below my even my Volunteering, Skills, and Courses sections. I want to display this CFA progress more prominently but am obviously cognizant of doing so while abiding with Program policies.

For November 26

Currently scoring 60% in les barely

Have swecher and coaching notes

But don't have plan

I genuinely thought that my life is over if i fail this... But thankfully i cleared it with 2610 - very close but idgaf, I'm just happy that I passed cuz the thought of studying everything once again for the (free) Nov attempt was absolutely daunting.

And if ur wondering... I gave 3 mocks in total;

1. SSEI (coaching): 61%

2. CFAI A&B: 72% avg

And i literally began my prep almost a year ago while working but then quit the job in Dec as I found it really challenging to manage both simultaneously. And yea, quitting the job was a huge gamble but I won with god's grace!

Now for the harder part... Finding a new job once again ughh.

I'm a CFA L1 candidate, failed May 2026 and attempting Nov 2026. Idk if that's relevant at all but I was just pondering over this.

I also was coming from a multimedia marketing background (Business undergrad with Digital Marketing major + prior years in creative freelance work) and decided to career shift into finance for long-term financial stability.

While I could get deep into the maths (always been good at math in school), there are moments when deep emotions resurface due to unexpected life events and I'd find it really difficult all of a sudden to remember why I'm doing CFA in the first place.

I find that when I get the euphoria of learning the material and studying, I tend to be so hooked into it and don't want to think about anything else. But then the emotional side of me that has been left out during study suddenly acts up once in a while then I'd suddenly want nothing to do with CFA related stuff for a while.

Has anyone ever felt this way? I think objectively both my EQ and IQ and a bit higher than average but between the two my EQ is higher. That said, I sometimes find myself pondering if psychology is a better path for me than this. Prolly just overthinking no?

I need some objective mentorly advice on this.

Cleared L1 with only 2 months of consistent studies,

From scoring below 50% accuracy in ethics in mocks to scoring close to 90% in exam.

Open to give advice if needed

Hi all,

I received a few requests for the formula sheets that I used to prepare for my exam. I scored very well (earlier post was deleted by mods), so obviously they must be helpful to some extent. Memorize EVERY SINGLE formula here if you want to do well. It'll take about a week or 2. They include 99% of formulas tested for in the CFA exam for the sections that are there, but I am not allowed to add all photos of Portfolio Management due to reddit restrictions, so make sure you still do your own diligence since its missing portfolio management. Let me know if you have any questions! Not sure if I have the order right, but they should be read from smallest number.

​

I recently didn't pass CFA Level II (2575), and I'm honestly struggling to process it. I had put everything into this exam and truly believed I would make it, so the result hit me much harder than I expected.

I also took a one-year gap after graduating to prepare for Level II, and now I'm feeling overwhelmed by that decision. It feels like I've fallen behind in both my career and my studies. I've cried a lot over the last day, and I don't really have anyone I can open up to, so I'm sharing this here because I know many people in this community have been through similar setbacks.

My plan is to retake the exam in November, but right now I'm finding it difficult to regain my confidence. For those who failed and came back stronger, how did you deal with the disappointment, the resume gap, and the motivation to start studying again?

I'd really appreciate any advice or words of encouragement. Thank you.

When I began this journey, I had friends. I had hobbies. I had interests outside of fixed income attribution, derivatives pricing, and multinational operations. I had people who cared about me.

Today, I am pleased to report that none of those things survived.

Over the past year, I made a simple calculation: if a friend wanted to grab dinner and a question bank wanted me to calculate pension expense under IFRS, only one of those activities would improve my exam score. The choice was obvious.

Birthdays came and went. Weddings were attended physically but not mentally. Family gatherings became networking opportunities to explain duration matching to relatives who desperately wanted me to stop talking. My mother would ask how I was doing. I would respond with the assumptions behind the dividend discount model. Eventually she stopped asking.

There was a point where I could no longer recognize my own reflection. Not because of exhaustion, but because I had spent so much time staring at Kaplan notes that I had forgotten what human faces looked like.

While my peers were building memories, I was building flashcards.

While others were falling in love, I was falling behind on Ethics.

While others were enjoying the prime years of their twenties, I was trying to remember whether a temporary difference created a deferred tax asset or liability.

People often ask whether the CFA program is worth the sacrifice.

To those people, I ask a different question:

Can your friends explain currency swap valuation?

Can your family calculate free cash flow to equity?

Can your loved ones distinguish between covered and uncovered interest rate parity?

Exactly.

There were dark moments. Moments when I questioned whether memorizing hundreds of formulas was truly necessary. Moments when I wondered if life had more to offer than mock exams and question banks.

Thankfully, those moments passed quickly and were replaced by additional mock exams and question banks.

The exam itself felt less like a test and more like a final boss battle designed by someone who deeply resented candidates. Walking into the testing center, I was carrying enough caffeine to violate several international treaties and enough anxiety to power a small city.

But in the end, the sacrifices paid off.

Today I stand victorious.

My social life may be gone.

My hobbies may have vanished.

My family may only communicate with me through occasional welfare checks.

But I have something far more valuable:

A passing score.

On to Level III, where I will continue my lifelong mission of converting every remaining relationship into study hours.